winner!

Update!

I won the costume contest at work today!

Here are some pictures from my day at work...as you can probably guess, not a whole lot of actual work took place!


The treats!


Now, I've gotta figure out what I want to buy with my prize...a gift card to Target!

I hope you've enjoyed my Halloween posts, and I hope all of you eat lots and lots of candy this weekend! Mine will be pretty low key (last class starts tomorrow...at 8 am!), but I'm looking forward to hanging out with Kate!

i'm a cupcake!

Happy Halloween!

Hope it's sweet (pun intended...)!

I just wanted to share what I'll be wearing for the costume contest at work. I can't say it was fun to make, but I guess it turned out okay. Let's just say from now on, I'll stick to making bite size cupcakes! Oh, and that's a handsewn felt cherry on top of my head :)

sweet tooth

Earlier this month, I had been planning on throwing a Halloween party. Unfortunately, work was just too busy and I didn't have the time or energy to get it all together. Luckily, my work had it's first annual "Halloween Luncheon" so I was able to take some of my party ideas and use them at work instead!

I wanted to stick to super easy treats that could be done without a lot of fuss, but I jazzed everything up with the Halloween printables I purchased from Etsy seller, Shindig Parties.

Chex Mix

Marshmallows

These homemade marshmallows are so easy to make, and really taste worlds better than store bought ones. Definitely give it a try if you haven't, the recipe I posted had really clear directions and came out great.

Festive Cupcake Stand - I made the cupcakes after this post,
but they were Pumpkin with Pumpkin Spice Buttercream

The printables were super easy to use, and really made all of the treats look professional and polished...I love that!

What Halloween treats have you made?

pumpkin carving

One night after work, C and I decided to hit the pumpkin patch! It turned out to be a big bust, as there really wasn't much to do there and the pumpkins themselves were super expensive.

Instead, we picked up our pumpkins at the local Trader Joe's, where they were going for $2.99 each. Oh, how I love that store and I'm not sure how I ever lived without it!

After deciding which patterns to use, we got to work. It was dead silent as we each were sawing away at our little pumpkin designs, determined not to screw it up. Nearly 2 hours later, and we were finished!

Last step was to add a candle to each, and watch them come to life!!

[all pictures courtesy of our camera phone]

And just to clarify, I did the spider web, while C is completely responsible for the howling wolf :)

I'm Back!

I have been busy, busy, busy!

It's been mostly work, but I've had some fun here and there, too!

First off, Kate's birthday! I'm so grateful for Kate's friendship and feel so blessed that our blogs brought us together. She is seriously one of the most genuine and kind people I have met here in Los Angeles and she makes it feel more like home!


One weekend, C and I went with a couple of friends to the Outdoor Cinema Food Fest! It's an event that takes place in different parks around Los Angeles and they play a movie on a HUGE inflatable screen and they have a dozen or so various food trucks there to feed you! We went to see the screening of Back to the Future! Believe it or not, I had never seen the movie. I thought it was great though and the event is such a good idea and a lot of fun!

[picture via jd raimer]

I think I've mentioned it before, but C is really into craft beer. Los Angeles recently had LA Beer Week and the culmination of the week was a large beer fest down at Union Station. Of course we had to go :)

It was a dreary day, but we still had a good time!


I also had a cupcake order for a birthday party. I was up until 3 am, but the cupcakes turned out amazing, and I'm glad to say the clients were uber happy! I made a Snickers cupcake (recipe found here) and it was phenomenal! I highly recommend it. The only trouble I had was making the homemade caramel sauce, but after about 5 tries, I got it right and it tasted delicious!


Staying with the cupcake theme, C and I had a get together to go to and we couldn't show up empty-handed. I had leftover ingredients from the birthday order so I made the same cupcakes, but topped them with festive toppers that I made (great tutorial here)!

We were watching the Patriots play, in case you couldn't tell what the toppers were.


Thanks so much to all of you for the support and kind words during my little bloggy break. I expect to be back in full force now that work has finally slowed down (PTL!). Truth be told, I can never really stay away for very long!

Oh, and PS - It's going to be Halloween Overload here on Sweet Tea Diaries, starting tomorrow! Get excited!