Bunco and baking

Last night I hosted Bunco for the first (and quite possibly the last) time.  Everyone was such a great sport about cramming into my teeny-weeny house and putting up with my booby-trap of a dining room table.  (Yes, if you move it from its carefully propped position against the wall, the back leg will completely fall off.  It is a pretty junky table from an auction, but we still need to fix it and reduce the risk of injury, loss of dinner, or a collapsed Axis and Allies game.)  I made fajitas with all of the trimmings, which has to be one of my favourite large-group recipes of all time.  It worked really swell to chop up all of the chicken and vegetables whilst Harriet was happy, stick them in the fridge, and then throw them in the cast iron skillet closer to the time of the party.  I found a bunch of neat frames and filled them with Bunco pictures (thanks to Alissa and Clara!) for the prizes.  Harriet did a better job at this Bunco than at last month's gathering.  This probably has to do with a) she is a whole month older, b) she was in her own house, and c) Steve kindly took her on a jog around the block so I could finish preparing which resulted in Fresh Air and a Nap.  We had a lot of good laughs, jolly conversation, lots of Buncos (what was it...five in one round?) and only a few misunderstandings about what roll we were on (that would be me happily rolling sixes instead of fives).  All in all, I think that it was a pretty happening time.

Harriet and I are baking today.  It feels good to redeem the day since after Steve got home from work this morning, we all ended crawling back into bed and I fell asleep until 9:45am.  After cleaning up Harriet's explosive diaper (I had just as much on me as she had in the diaper) and getting ready for the day, I put the babster in the Sleepy Wrap and away we went.  There are currently two dozen cupcakes ready to be frosted and a loaf of Honey Oat Wheat Bread rising on the counter.  You can find the recipe for the bread here at Thoughts and Whatnots. (And if you want to read an upbeat, albeit realistic blog, I would highly recommend subscribing.  I always have fun reading Leanna's posts.)

This is the second order of cupcakes that I have decorated for requests made at the Westside Bakery.  I think that decorated cupcakes are pretty much amazing and I have experimented with decorating some for myself.  I love looking at books like Hello, Cupcake and the cupcake recipes on Martha Stewart.  I tried the Flourless Chocolate Cupcakes for Bunco last night and they were loverly.  But the thought of doing it for others is a little scary for Perfectionist Me.  I mean, there are so many variables with frosting...it oobs and gloobs and messes up all of the time.  However, I agreed to do an order of 150-200 cupcakes and two cupcake bouquets for a birthday party last week and I was shocked at how well everything turned out.  Now some of the folks who attended the birthday party have ordered two dozen brightly frosted cupcakes for this afternoon.  I think it would be neat to be able to make a little extra money on the side doing cupcakes, so we'll see where this goes.

I had more to say but one-handed typing is a little rough.