Graduation Cupcakes

Using the same vanilla cupcake and cream cheese frosting recipe as I did here, I made these graduation cupcakes for my daughter's Pre-K class! 

The hats are made from 2 Oreos stacked with a graham cracker on top, all dipped in baking chocolate.  The tassle is made from 2 Red Vines, cut to an appropriate length and the button is an M&M!  These were a big hit (and very filling!)

Vanilla Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

I got the urge to learn how to make my own vanilla cupcakes.  Billy Reese, owner of Billy's Bakery NYC, has a fantastic recipe that I used!  The recipe is as follows:

Billy's Vanilla, Vanilla Cupcakes
Ingredients:

Makes about 30 cupcakes
1 3/4 cups cake flour, not self-rising
1 1/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
2 cups sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into 1-inch cubes
4 large eggs
1 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 325°. Line cupcake pans with paper liners; set aside. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine flours, sugar, baking powder, and salt; mix on low speed until combined. Add butter, mixing until just coated with flour.

2. In a large glass measuring cup, whisk together eggs, milk, and vanilla. With mixer on medium speed, add wet ingredients in 3 parts, scraping down sides of bowl before each addition; beat until ingredients are incorporated but do not overbeat.

3. Divide batter evenly among liners, filling about two-thirds full. Bake, rotating pan halfway through, until a cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean, 17 to 20 minutes.

4. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. Repeat process with remaining batter. Once cupcakes have cooled, use a small offset spatula to frost tops of each cupcake. Decorate with sprinkles, if desired. Serve at room temperature.

Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients:

• 4 ounces unsalted butter, softened
• 4 ounces cream cheese, softened
• 2 cups powdered sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions:

In a large bowl, beat together the butter and cream cheese with an electric mixer. With the mixer on low speed, add the powdered sugar a cup at a time until smooth and creamy. Beat in the vanilla extract.

For the "W," I melted down some Hershey's Kisses in a double boiler and piped them onto a piece of wax paper.  I put the warm chocolate in a ziploc bag, pushed all the chocolate into one of the bottom corners of the bag and then cut a tiny bit of that corner off.  I made many "W's" and put them in the freezer for about 15 minutes.  I then, picked the best ones to put on the cupcakes!

Wheels!

Wheels and Transportation were discussed in this unit, each child was supposed to pick a number of wheels and draw a picture of something with that number of wheels.  We, then, made a train in the hallway of all of the pictures!

Classroom Door- Christmas/Winter

Snowman Door!

Halloween Bulletin Board

Feet were painted with white paint and a footprint was made.  After the paint dried, the students made a face and arms holding something healthy to eat.  We discussed making good choices and eating healthy foods to make sure we had healthy teeth!

Thanksgiving Bulletin Board

Recipe for Thanksgiving Bulletin Board

Word Wall

Word Wall with words coded by long/short vowel sounds, sight words, and color words!

Literacy Focus Wall "Get In The Game"

Literacy Focus Wall with a football theme.  Included are the Unit of Study, letter of the week, vocabulary, part of speech studying for the week, good work example, and sight words learned. Underneath are word webs for each letter of the alphabet!

Picture Graphs

Picture Graphs of how many boys and girls were in our class and what our favorite M&M colors were.  The M&M graph was done after each student made his/her own bar graph of the number of the different color M&M's they had in their fun size bag of M&M's!

Easy Way to Hang Artwork

Easy and fun way to hang artwork!  Line wall with 2 rows of border.  Attach a cute picture (I used a star) with each student's name to a clothespin, then attach to the border.  This usually lasts the entire school year, and the students always know where their school work is hanging!

Pumpkin Path Hallway Display

Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater hallway/door display.  Kids decorate pumpkin and pose for pictures.  Teacher cuts pumpkin and picture out and put together.  This was used with a lesson on the life cycle of plants (pumpkins) and how they grow!

Classroom Door- Thanksgiving

My classroom door (Pilgrim) and others for Thanksgiving!

Classroom Door- Halloween Ideas

Pictures of my door at Halloween (Spider) and some others!

Classroom Door- Apple

This is a picrure of my classroom door a few years ago, when the school year began!

Crayon Wreath

Tess made this for Heather for Christmas!  Heather was floored and so excited to get it!  Shhh!  It was Heather's favorite Christmas present this year! :)

Welcome!

Welcome to 2 Crafty Chicks!  My sister and I are excited to show you all of the neat things we have come up with over the years and all of the new things we make and discover!  Ok, here we go!!