Hi, my name is Jess and I'm a t-shirt-aholic.

Today's Woot (which I bought - it's called "Height Envy"):


From Buy Olympia (debating the purchase since I'd have to get a men's cut t-shirt):

Johnny Cupcakes iPhone cases

I might have to get one.

Cup-a-Cake commercial

I love the cup-a-cake but maybe they should re-think their marketing strategy.

Target's Red Hot Shop

I was recently turned on to Target's Red Hot Shop by the lovely folks at Daily Candy. Browsing through this months picks, I came across something truly awesome:

No, your eyes do not deceive you. That is a mustache key holder. Fantabulous.

30 Rock

30 Rock is one of my favorite shows and while I love Tina Fey, I think the highlight of 30 Rock is Alec Baldwin and Jack Donaghy. He really has the best lines. Like this gem, from Thursday's episode, when welcoming Jennifer Aniston's guest character to New York:

"Let's see, we're using credit cards in cabs now, all the galleries have moved to Chelsea, and we're off cupcakes and we're back to donuts." 

Another cupcake shirt from Woot

Today's feature at shirt.woot.com is another cupcake shirt

I of course purchased it immediately. This brings the cupcake t-shirt count to 5. I fully accept that I have an illness.

More cupcake ornaments

I was at Urban Outfitters in Santa Cruz this weekend when I noticed a cupcake ornament as part of their Christmas display. My iPhone photo didn't turn out so well, but I found them on-line.

Juicy Couture Cupcake Earrings

I got my Nordstrom catalog in the mail and came across something from Juicy Couture that made me smile.





I love how the earring backs are the little Juicy crown. Some stuff from Juicy I really hate but some of it, like this, I can definitely get behind :).

Double True!

I know this is old but I only saw it for the first time today. Magnolia cupcakes and a shout out for Google. Double true!

Obama in Cupcakes

I have read about this in about 4 different places but it is just so awesome I needed to repost it. 

Zilly Rosen with her Barack Obama cupcake art. This took 1,240 (!!) to put together.

photo by Shasti O'Leary Soudant

Cupcakes Take the Cake has a great post on Zilly, including an interview with the artist. I just can't get over how much work went into this. 1,240 cupcakes! Apparently it took 6 8 hour days to bake and decorate all the cupcakes and 6 hours to set up the first time (it was moved to Obama's campaign headquarters in Buffalo and re-assembled). 

Relatedly, in her interview, Zilly also raves about Italian Meringue Buttercream frosting which I've decided I know must try. I love regular buttercream but I'd like to try a frosting that doesn't threaten to put people into a diabetic coma every time they eat it. I looked up a recipe and it seems a bit complicated so we'll see how it goes. I found a recipe here.

Cupcake Ornaments

The fact that there are cupcake ornaments does not come as a shocker. But I'm confused why Sur la Table is selling a square shaped cupcake ornament:

They are also selling a round version:

Sur la Table's food themed ornament collection also includes a hotdog, artichoke, french fries, and a hamburger, all of which amuse me greatly, especially the french fries.

Yes we did!

Halloween

Halloween is my all time favorite holiday. I love the goofiness and creativity of it and of course any excuse to be a kid again is fine by me. Halloween 2008 was a bit of a bust but I had fun anyway. 

I love making my own costume and this year was no different. I went as Jessie the Cowgirl from Toy Story 2. 

I'm a sucker for a character that shares my name and of course, being obsessed with Pixar, I love Toy Story. I already had the shoes and jeans. I bought a white button down shirt from the Gap and the hat I bought from Renton Western Wear (it was too small, being for a child, but that's OK). I bought the cow print fabric, fringe, red trim, and yellow paint from Mendel's, this awesome fabric/craft store in the Haight. This costume was assembled thanks to the magic of hot glue which I now cannot live without. Scott helped by painting the shirt yellow. I did the rest.

I found the belt (which has the California state seal on the buckle) at Buffalo Exchange. The bandana is from the ever useful 99 cent store. I am really not very crafty with non-food items so I was really pleased with how well my costume turned out. I think I did a really good job, if I do say so myself :).

The Google Halloween party was a bit of a bust. It got moved inside because of the rain. There weren't too many people as a result but there were some fun costumes:

Me and Indiana Jones

Jellyfish - really easy but great looking costume

cute dogs in costume

with some fellow cowboys

the G1

pinata

Super Mario!

Michael Phelps in the off-season

Juno!

There was also for some reason, a ridiculous number of pumpkin shaped sugar cookies. This picture only represents half of them!

This was my favorite pumpkin from the carving contest. The other entries weren't quite as inspired. As an added bonus, the entry is from my cafe, so woot! Creepy, huh?

Since Halloween is my favorite holiday, I had to have a party. Some of my friends bailed on me but the rest of us had fun.

I was more creative with my costume than my cupcakes. I had big plans for spooky decorations but ended up just using my sprinkle stash.

Some of our costumes*:

Lindsay and Rob as the Hamburglar and Grimace! 

Lindsay savors her loot.

Scott as an attacked Obama supporter, ala Ashley Todd.

Andrew as Ajay the generic tech support representative

Collin as Domo Kun

Hamburglar and Jessie

Everyone tried on the Domo Kun costume! Here's the Hamburglar trying to make a quick gettaway. 

And me.

As has become our yearly tradition, Scott and I carved pumpkins. 

Scott's yearly theme of nerdy pumpkin continues with the Mac logo.

I went the Barack O'Lantern route with my Obama pumpkin.

All in all it was a good Halloween but I hope 2009 is better!

*Adam's costume intentionally left out. Sorry!

Barack Obama Cookies

Obama Sugar Cookies

I had planned to make Obama cupcakes but I was worried about confining myself to such a small surface. So instead I decided to try sugar cookies. I bought a pretty large circular cookie cutter for these. Using this size only yielded 19 cookies from the recipe. I used store bought tubed icing for this, since I still haven't mastered the art of using a pastry bag and wanted an easy way to pipe the design. The white icing is Wilton's Cookie Icing and acts like a royal icing. The red and blue frosting, Wilton's Sparkle Gel, is unfortunately not meant for cookies and therefore remains sticky, even 2 days later, meaning I can't stack the cookies. The sparkle gives it a little something extra though, so I'm not that disappointed :). I think they turned out surprisingly well. Scott assisted with these. He had both the best and worst looking cookies :). 

One thing I did differently was this recipe called for an optional addition of lemon extract which I decided to try. The lemon flavor was much stronger in the batter than the final baked cookie but I think it gives it a little something extra in the flavor department from your typical sugar cookie. They taste a bit less dense. 

I also loved the way this recipe called for rolling out the cookies. I rolled the dough out between to sheets of wax paper right after I finished making it and then put it in the fridge. I was able to avoid the huge flour mess I usually encounter with sugar cookies. I usually avoid sugar cookies like the plague because they are such a pain to make but now with this new method, I think I'll be making them more. They are so much fun to decorate!

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot

I never thought I'd say this, but I think the underground bacon movement has gone too far.

Bacon Floss brought to you by Urban Outfitters:
Mmmm...bacon. Make oral hygiene delicious with this bacon flavored dental floss. Each dispenser contains 27.3 yards of great tasting bacon floss.

Yup, you read that right. Bacon flavored dental floss. There are no words.