cupcakes & candy

We found eggs, we found Easter baskets, we ate jelly beans, we ate a huge brunch (mom made a fritatta AND french toast made from carrot cake!), we found more eggs, we cooked our ham, we ate a huge dinner, we found more Easter baskets and we ate more jelly beans (and chocolate eggs and peanut butter eggs and marshmallow bunnies). So, needless to say, "Diet Back ON". The kid was absolutely nuts by the end of the day after all that sugar. This morning he's poking his head here and there in search of his candy stash which has been placed way up high out of little hand reach. I am not ready to see him in hyper-overdrive again. Still recovering from yesterday. And, silly as it may sound, we're going to be dying more eggs this morning because a half dozen is still sitting in the fridge. Busy weekend kept us from finishing up and there's absolutely no way you're going to make a 3-year old understand that because Easter is over there is no need to finish dying the remaining eggs. Nope. It's easier to just let him do it.

The sky still looks like it's threatening to rain - but it looked this way yesterday and all we got was a little drizzle. I wish it would rain though. One of the many Easter goodies given to baby was this great little noise/music maker called the Rainforest Waterfall Peek-a-Boo Soother. I'm listening to this thing now - sound of a creek, crickets and birds chirping - and it's making me so relaxed and zen. Don't even know that I'll hook it up to the crib or cradle. This thing is going where I go! Maybe this is why I want rain. Since it's not cold, I'd love to be able to open up all the windows and listen to it come down. This is why I need to find myself living in Hawaii one of these days. I think that's where I'd like to be when I'm old. The grand kids can fly out to granny's little grass shack every summer vacation. Yep, I sure do love those showers.

Now, for these mini cupcakes. I went overboard and made a butter cream frosting. Decadent! The recipe came from a book that is becoming a very reliable source of great recipes: The Gourmet Cookbook by Ruth Reichl. I'm such a sucker for these interviews on the Today Show, so when I saw Ruth Reichl talk about the cookbook and how they tested again and again all the favorite recipes that were initially published in Gourmet Magazine, I thought, "I must have that cookbook!" But, so far every recipe I've tried has been fantastic. I may just have to work my way through this book in true Julie Powell (author of Julie + Julia) fashion - recipe by recipe until all god-knows-how-many are tried and tested by yours truly. But as I just said, Diet back ON, so maybe I'll wait till the weight is off before tackling a project like this.

Hope you all had a nice Easter Sunday!