Musical musings for February

My birthday month is coming to a close with only a few days left of February. It has been a fun filled month, which I hope is just a sign of things to come for the rest of 2013. As we have inched closer to March I have been getting really excited for the concert I will be attending next Saturday, that of Maroon 5. One of the things I do love about living in Vancouver is that an array of music artists and acts, both big and small, come here to perform. What is even better is the price of the cheapest tickets because honestly I am not sure if there is one act that I would want to pay the big bucks to see. In anticipation of this upcoming concert as well as the one I have in April, I used the iTunes 'complete my album' feature for both Maroon 5 and Marianas Trench's latest albums. This meant that quite a few songs made their way cheaply into my iTunes library. Rounding out my musical musings for this month were the following two songs:

1. Ho Hey - The Lumineers
2. When I Was Your Man - Bruno Mars

Seeing as concerts had a strong influence on my purchases in February, I will sign off by mentioning that I really hope to get tickets tomorrow for the Justin Timberlake / Jay-Z concert in July.

February's music can be found on these albums (images courtesy of iTunes)

Mini cupcakes

Recently I was asked to make some mini cupcakes for a bridal shower and I was more than happy to oblige. I had never made mini cupcakes before so I was excited for this opportunity. It wasn't that long before I had a few ideas swirling around in my head. I chose chocolate cupcakes and butter cream frosting recipes from one of my favourite bloggers Bakerella. The only tweaking I did was with to the frosting recipe, as I wanted a thinner consistency. To achieve the consistency I wanted I added a little bit of milk at a time until I was happy with the result. The colours of the bridal shower were yellow and purple. I used Wilton products to tint the frosting yellow and once I was finished with this colour I added some pink and blue until I achieved a satisfactory purple. The idea I settled on was to use a spatula to frost the cupcake yellow before sprinkling on Wilton coloured sugar in the alternate colour of purple. The sugar was sprinkled with a purpose into the middle of a homemade template to create a heart shape once the sprinkling was complete. The opposite was also done in using purple frosting and yellow coloured sugar. In my mind the idea looked fabulous and polished. The actual result wasn't too shabby. To help with identifying the hearts as being just that, a template was also created so that when the sprinkling was complete there was an outline of a heart left in it's place.

I must say that while I made the cupcakes, the frosting and had the original idea I did have a lot of help with the creation of the hearts from my housemate. Thus, the project turned into a little bit of a decorating 101 class, which I think was a lot of fun.

I was told that the cupcakes were a big hit at the bridal shower. I must confess that I had four of them myself. I was able to eat so many because the trick is to make more than you need so that you can experiment and allow for mistakes. The mistakes tasted delicious and I think from now on I will make sure I have more than I need to allow for taste testing of the final product.

Utilizing faux leather

Sometimes I get complete tunnel vision when I lock onto a fashion item that I see on someone else in passing. The item could be anything, but whatever it is wedges it's way into my brain and a casual liking turns into the belief that I really need to get one for myself. The current piece of clothing to fall victim to my tunnel vision is a faux leather sleeve utility jacket. There is something about the material and colour combination that appeals to me. This need may pass, but incase it doesn't I have found a few options online from some retailers I have become a fan of (images courtesy of their websites) - H&M, Zara, Aritzia and Forever 21.

They have varying price points and styles, but I think I could be happy with any of them making their way into my wardrobe.

High Tea

I don't know about you, but I totally don't mind if birthday celebrations take place over several days or even a week after the date. This is why on the Saturday following my birthday I had one final celebration to mark the occasion. I went to High Tea with five of my most favourite people in Vancouver for a fun lunchtime spread of deliciousness. The location for the outing was The Secret Garden in Kerrisdale, which has a nice main street that I would like to explore one day soon. The High Tea was absolutely lovely from the brightly coloured teapots snug in their cosies to the delicious three tiers of bite-sized treats. I would have to say that my favourite item was the cranberry scones, which were so scrumptious when covered with the cream and jam. I definitely recommend going to High Tea at least once in your lifetime and if you are in the area then definitely check out The Secret Garden. It is such a lovely and intimate setting without any pretense. I immediately became a big fan of this place and it just strengthened the fact that I really enjoy having High Tea. I can't wait for my next High Tea experience, which may possibly be with my sister in New York City at the famous Plaza Hotel.

A few days in LA

I figure it is a pretty rare thing to have a milestone birthday fall on the Saturday of a long weekend even if it is thanks to a newly created provincial holiday. I am really grateful that the stars aligned this way so that I could have such a fun weekend. On my thirty years plus one day of being we moved from the Disneyland area to Santa Monica. I don't think I already mentioned this, but I have been to Los Angeles twice before with the last time being in 2006. Each visit has seen me gravitate to Santa Monica maybe because of its familiarity or due to the laid back nature of this beachside area. It was too early to check in so we made a beeline for the pier via the beach and after a few happy snaps we began the city sightseeing hop on hop off tour. I definitely recommend doing the tour if you are short on time, if it is your first visit or you are without a car. Before leaving for the trip I had a look at the public transportation system and it didn't really seem tourist friendly so we had already decided to do the tour. It was an excellent decision and I really enjoyed the interesting narrative that went along with the ride. We got to cruise through the areas of Brentwood, Westwood, Beverly Hills, West Hollywood, Hollywood, Century City and West LA. We hopped off the tour to check out the touristy sights from Hollywood & Vine to the Chinese Theatre before picking up where we left off and making our way back to the beach for check in. That night we strolled around Santa Monica squeezing in a teeny bit of shopping and a delicious dinner. The waitress was even sweet enough to bring out a slice of red velvet cake with a lit candle. The last day of the long weekend was the warmest of them all and involved the tour once more. We got off to explore the Farmers Market and the adjacent The Grove shopping area. Our only celebrity sighting occurred here thanks to the filming of the TV show Extra, which allowed us to spot the hosts Mario Lopez and Maria Menounos. Instead of waiting for the next bus, we walked to the Millions of Milkshakes stop to both skip a number of stops and in the hopes of having a milkshake. This is where we met the last disappointment of the weekend because the store was closed for filming and wouldn't be reopening until long after we had to leave. We got back on a tour bus and finished our time by soaking up some sun. The trek back home was delayed due to an issue on the flight, but eventually we returned to reality. The lovely flowers that were waiting at the doorstep from a dear sweet friend cushioned this return to reality and my new age. Birthdays mean you are now a year older and while that may seem like a bad thing, I cannot help feeling loved because of the well wishes and gestures of those that matter to me.

Officially thirty

Today for the first time since my birthday I had to write my age and it was a weird feeling doing so. Yes I am officially thirty and I had the best weekend celebrating the occasion. There may have been a few hiccups, but life is full of them and it makes things interesting. I think turning the big three zero and spending it down in Los Angeles is worthy of more than one post so today I am going to focus on my actual birthday day. Disneyland was a fantastic choice for celebrating a milestone. Not to dwell on any negatives, but there were moments of disappointment with technical issues on rides and more so with each discovery that a ride was closed. Unfortunately there were too many of these moments, but each of these instances was erased many times over by everything that was possible. Highlights included having a photo with Mickey Mouse, the many birthday wishes from cast members and of course the rides. The weather was lovely, the rides were fun (well the ones I was brave enough to go on because age doesn't bring me courage) and the atmosphere was all together happy. We had a front row seat for the nightly parade, which was colourfully entertaining with so many familiar characters taking part. However, a long day amongst other things led me to an early bedtime. So now I am thirty, which is something I will have to get used to writing and saying, but it helps that I don't look my age. Anyway my birthday was only one day of a fun weekend so consider this recount to be continued...

Goodbye twenties...

Four sleeps is all I have left of my twenties and when you think about it technically I don't even have that many. I imagine I will still be awake as Friday rolls into Saturday, thus turning twenty-nine into the big three zero. When I think about it, I was probably too young to reflect on the end of my teens, still caught up in the wonders of life and the endless possibilities ahead as I got ready for my second year of university and my first overseas trip. For the occasion itself, I couldn't even tell you how I celebrated the beginning of my twenties, but I imagine it involved some sort of joint celebration with my mum, whom I share my birthday with. Fast forward to the present and I still think life is wonderful and that the possibilities are endless, but now I know more about the world and have ten additional years of experience and adventures under my belt to reflect upon. I kind of wish my nineteen year old self had written to the twenty-nine year old me with her hopes and dreams for the future to see if any of them had come true. Regardless, life has definitely been interesting during this decade and I have had so many amazing experiences with an array of fantastic people on different continents. Even the sad or not so fun times have meant something to me. I cannot wait to see what is in store for me during this next decade, maybe I will finally figure out what I want to be when I grow up, get married, have children and create a wonderful home. All I do know is that no matter what life throws at me, I am going to try to have fun with it, not sweat the small stuff, live each day to the fullest and just be happy. If all else fails I will remember that I got to spend the first day of my thirties with Mickey Mouse and Friends at Disneyland with a pretty cool partner in crime and my loved ones in my thoughts.

Super Bowl and cupcakes

I think I have accidentally started a tradition with myself in relation to the Super Bowl. Last year, as mentioned here, I made cupcakes for a viewing party. This year I am again watching the big game and I apparently still have the need to bake cupcakes. Although, the cupcake inspiration was mainly due to helping some friends move yesterday and seeing the amount of baking supplies that were unearthed in the process. It made me realise that it had been a little while since I had baked. Cupcakes are always fun to bake because of the endless varieties and decorating options. However, most times I just can't go past a good old reliable vanilla cupcake. It didn't take me long to find a new recipe to try out with this one being my choice. One thing to note with this recipe is that I found I needed to bake the cupcakes for 25 to 30 minutes. As you probably know by now I like to put my own twist on things. As such, before I moved my focus to the butter cream frosting, I melted a bar of Ghirardelli peppermint bark baking chocolate, which I had received from my Christmas visitors. I scooped out a small hole in each cupcake with a teaspoon and put some of the melted chocolate in there. 

Making butter cream frosting is one of my favourite things because I think I have gotten quite good at adding a little bit of this to a little bit of that and coming up with a batch of deliciousness. I decided to make vanilla butter cream frosting and tint it pink. I then turned half of the batch into chocolate butter cream frosting. The ingredients I used were:

• 4 cups icing sugar
• 1 tsp meringue powder
• 1/4 cup butter, softened
• 3 tbsp milk
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• pink colouring to tint
• 2 tbsp cocoa powder and 2 tsp water (for the chocolate butter cream frosting)
• extra water for a thinner consistency

I combined all of the ingredients until I had a frosting consistency I was happy with. After I had removed half of the mixture, I added the cocoa powder and water to make the chocolate butter cream frosting. I used a Wilton 21 decorating tip to decorate the cupcakes starting with the chocolate butter cream frosting. Next was some of the pink frosting. I finished off the cupcakes with a sprinkle of chocolate jimmies and Nestle Toll House mini morsels toppers that I guess you could say was part of my reward for being a good helper yesterday.
Just to go back to the point of today - not that I have a vested interested in the outcome of this year's Super Bowl, but I do hope the Ravens win!