Colored sushi wrappers...

Every now and then, I like to check out www.strangenewproducts.com and trust me, some of the things I see are REALLY strange...Like the 'penis stretcher.' If you want to know more about it, check it out yourself because I really don't want to comment on it! hehehe
Well, I did find something that I'd love to get my hands on. Colored sushi wrappers. I love sushi especially homemade sushi my mom makes. I've tried my hand at making it and it's no easy task but I think something like this would give me the courage to try it again. I wonder if they come in purple. They're available at www.friedas.com.
I need to blog more about cupcakes soon!

A special lotion bar for a special someone!

As some of you may know, I make bath and beauty products. I make them when I have the time to make them (kids sleeping, kids at school) or when I have the supplies to make them. I can only get the supplies online and sometimes it's really a pain to keep up with what I have left versus how much I have to make what I need.
I make lotion bars, which is basically solidified lotion. The warmth of your skin will gently melt the lotion bar and allow the oils to penetrate into your skin. It may feel a bit oily at first, but within a few minutes, the oils absorb into your skin and you'll feel soft and supple all day long. There is a good write up about lotion bars here and it's basically the same ingredients I use.
What I love about lotion bars is that you can carry it in your purse and not worry about it accidentally spilling in there. Usually when I make them, I give it as gifts or use them myself. Lately, I've had many requests to sell them at the local market and a horticulture garden wants citrus-scented lotion bars to sell at their site. Though it may seem enticing, I wonder if I'd ever be able to fulfill the supply and demand aspect of it. Remember, my life revolves around my family first! Also, a deep dark secret of mine, is that I'm a REALLY bad procrastinator. To the point that sometimes it ashames me.
Well, I made a bunch of lotion bars and I promised to give one as a trade to Joleen, who designed this site for me. She likes citrus scents so I made 'Tangerine Dreams' which has the "aroma of juicy, freshly squeezed tangerines with base notes of vanilla & fresh greenery." It's the same one that my kids used during their trip to the dentist a while ago. I got rave reviews about that one, which I blogged about a few weeks ago.


I use natural ingredients that are good for your skin. Shea butter "is a superb moisturizer, gentle enough for use on babies and sensitive skin and has exceptional healing properties." Sweet Almond Oil is used "to help to give it unequalled penetrating and restructuring properties." Candellila Wax is a "unique vegetable wax helps provide gloss and lubricity ("slip") to lip balms and lotion bars." I also use FD&C Fragrance and Colorants.

Here are all the ingredients melted, mixed together and ready to be pour into push-up lotion tubes. I love these tubes, they're too cute for words.

These are all ready to be labeled and shrink wrapped. The one already labeled belongs to Joleen. I will ship it out for her today. I hope she enjoys it!

Made by Joleen!

I'm so delighted about my newly designed blog site! Joleen of Joleen's Artistic Endeavor's created this design for me! Isn't it gorgeous? I'm so happy right now and it's the most wonderful design I could've ever wanted. She incorporated the 'purple' and the 'cupcake' perfectly. Thank you, Joleen!
FYI, Joleen is a very talented and amazing woman. She's very creative and whenever I visit her site, it makes me feel so cheery inside. She's such a caring person and very professional indeed! I don't remember how I stumbled across her site but I am so glad I did. Once you read her blog, her photos will mesmerize you! It's such an enchanting site and I guarantee you'll agree when you take a peek.
Once again, THANK YOU Joleen!

It's been a while since my last post due to a huge order of party favors that had me up until 3 am last Thursday! This order was placed weeks in advance but my daughter, Danielle, got sick and I had to put off working on the order until just about 2 days before they were due! Something, I'll never do again!
Both my daughters came to my rescue and I treated them to the movies afterwards.

These are Hershey's Kiss favors. Basically, it's a personalized sticker adhered to the round, flat bottom of the kiss. I place 5 in a bag with ribbons and tags attached.

These are the personalized candy bars. There were 2 orders last week. One had a Care Bear theme and the other was a Spring themed Christening.

These are heart shaped soap favors. They are made from glycerin soap. I have hundreds of scents so my customers could order just about any scent they like. Also, I have all sorts of colorants so my soaps are made to their individual preferences.

These are the soap favors when they had just been poured into the mold and are hardening up. It takes nearly 20 minutes before I could start unmolding them.

Here are the soap favors packaged up and ready to go. I usually coordinate matching ribbons with the soap favors. My customer was so happy with her orders. Her kind comments made my day!

Tinkerbell ain't got nothin' on me!

Can you tell which dog is real?
Maybe it's a dead give away but the puppy on the left is my long-haired chihuahua, Gizmo. I bought the porcelain chihuahua yesterday and everyone who comes into my house freaks out at it because it looks real. It takes them a while to figure out it's not moving and therefore...fake! It's hilarious to watch my guests!

So here's Gizmo hamming it up for the digicam!

Quick snack

Whenever I want a quick and easy snack, I fry up some frozen lumpia and it hits the spot! I love finger food and with lumpia, you can add whatever you want into it and it always tastes great. What fried food isn't, huh?
Well today, I made this recipe and it knocked the socks off my family! I used sweet ginger chili sauce for dipping and it was out of this world. I've never made the pancit part but I'm sure it's yummy as well. You might think there's a lot of steps, but once you get the hang of it, you'll be pleased with the results. It's worth the all the work.

How to make frosted popcorn favors

As promised, this is how I make frosted popcorn favors. I had an order for 100 blueberry, chocolate and caramel favors today. So I thought it would be cool to snap these photos even though it was hard as hell! Opening up the Whirley Pop is like asking for death itself. The melted frosting burns like lava!
Anywho, yes, I use a Whirley Popcorn maker! I know, I know, I should use a movie theatre-type maker but I don't know, I just don't want to buy one. They're huge and require a permanent place in the house because they are extremely heavy.
My husband insists I buy one. I've made enough money from just popcorn favors to pay for the big popcorn machine 10 times over. They cost well over $1,000. Maybe I will, maybe I won't. I just don't know WHERE I would put the darn thing.

This is the first stage: I measure out just 3 ingredients and dump it into the Whirley Pop...

The second stage is the most critical of all. If the pot is too hot, you can burn the popcorn. Trial and error has made me perfect this stage with my eyes closed! Also had an extremely painful experience when I opened the lid to take a quick peek. Liquid sugar burns like a mofo!

This is the third stage where I transfer the cooked popcorn into large plastic bowls and let the popcorn cool on it's own without stirring it. Trial and error again has proved that this method prevents less breakage. DUH!!!!

This is the last stage where I bag them up, tag them and they're ready to be paid for!!!

This is the caramel flavored popcorn. A lot of grown-ups love this flavor. I get tons of orders for gallon-sized bags of this. I believe because it's a classic flavor.

And lastly, Chocolate flavored popcorn. I love this one but I have been told that it tastes burned but it's just the dark cocoa flavoring. True chocoholics appreciate this flavor! (like me)

Popcorn flavors

There are A LOT more boxes of wonderful sweet flavorings behind these and MORE in another cupboard...I have orders tomorrow and was looking up to get a few boxes and decided to show you how I make flavored popcorn...I'll post them tomorrow!

Bunnies, candies and sprinkles, oh my!

I love seasonal items, especially Easter-themed stuff. They are the cutest around and I love the pretty pastel colors they come in. I found these mini ceramic bunny dishes for less than $4. I bought all 3 of them! I figure I'll make creme brulee in it for Easter.

If you've watched "The Chronicles of Narnia", remember when Edmund gobbled up those turkish delights? Made you want some, didn't it? Well, I stumbled across these at the store. They're deliciously sweet, soft and powdery which reminded me of that part in the movie. I assume that they're quite similar. These candies are called 'Loukoumi'. It's an authentic ancient Byzantine candy recipe that is famous in the Eastern Mediterranean. The candies come flavored in lemon, orange, cinnamon, begamot and rose. The gummy aroma from the candies are from the island of Chios.

Meet a few of my cupcake's best friends. I'm going to buy Easter colored sprinkles today in preparation for our family Easter parties coming up soon! Pics to come as well.

It arrived, it arrived! Yummy!!!!!

A while ago, I posted about a candyswap that I participated in. Well, my package of sweet goodness arrived today all the way from New Mexico! Karen was my secret swap partner and she sent me candy from Hawaii because although she lives in New Mexico, she was born and raised in Hawaii.
My favorite pieces were the "Candy Champagne Glasses" that are Cherry and Apple flavored. I love 'em because they don't sell these on Guam. How cool! I opened the Apple glass and my kids and I drank Gatorade from it for many hours until DanBoy took a huge bite out of it :o) Danielle said "Wow, Mommy, it's like we're in the Willy Wonka movie in his factory!" I was thinking the same thing...As I type this, our stomachs are enjoying all the sugary goodness.
I can't wait for the next swap!
As for the chocolate-dipped ika (dried squid), it was quite interesting...I mean, I LOVE ika and I LOVE chocolate but the combination was something I can't really explain in words. It's probably a combination that would be an aquired taste for most people. I enjoyed it none the less.