they're all growed up

lately, my posts have been a bit sporadic and i apologize to all of you who follow this blog.  you may recall me mentioning my book-the actual purpose for starting this blog (once it was finished, i moved on to pies) and the publication of that book.  well, it's out there and doing well.  it is fun to look it up on amazon and see the ranking-i frequently find it in the top 3 for pies along with martha stewart's pie book.  curious?   look here and scroll down to see the ranking.  some of the media events for the book have made my schedule a little tight and that is only part of the reason for my late posts.

the real reason i have not been keeping up is that suddenly, my nest is empty.  we have two wonderful daughters and this past summer, both of them graduated; one from college and one from high school.  it has been a summer full of family and parties and i have enjoyed every minute and every opportunity to see extended family from out of state.  there was tons of food and lots of baking and plenty of good wine to wash it down.  but now that our first has moved and settled in atlanta, our second is preparing to fly west; she leaves today.  and as every parent will tell you, you work so hard to get them ready for all that life will throw at them but when the time comes, letting them field the balls is the hardest thing you will ever do.  so with a little motherly worry, i will let her go.  the good thing is that she won't be totally on her own, she will be with her grandparents.

on our last day together (until she comes home again in about 8 weeks), we did things that she likes to do.  her favorite thing-eat cupcakes!  we went to the cupcake collection and had our fill.

the cupcake collection

the cupcake collection is located in the germantown neighborhood of north nashville in an old victorian house that has been renovated to accommodate a busy bakery.  the staff is friendly and will answer your questions cheerfully.  best part-the cupcakes are only $1.50 each.  let that sink in a minute.  i fully expected to pay about $3 each and was a bit surprised.  then i realized that is why we waited in line-people come from all around the area to buy them at this price.  but the best part is that they are actually baked from scratch-music to a pastry chefs ears!!!  i've been to several cupcake shops and one used mixes-they were awful, one used tall towers of frosting to make the cupcakes seem gigantic and they were nothing special.  so when i tasted these-i was totally impressed and completely sold.  from now on, when it's cupcakes, it's the cupcake collection or make them myself!

my daughter and the loot-she picked out 6 different flavors to try

and i hadn't even gotten the car out of park before she dove in and ate her cookies and cream cupcake.  at one point, she let out the familiar "no way!"  when i inquired, she told me the middle was filled with frosting too-what more does a teenage girl need?

so having fed her dessert first, i then took her to lunch and then home to bake a pie.  yes a pie.  last week, our older daughter was home and i baked a pie with her as well.  so my next two posts will be about baking pies with my daughters. for now, here's more about the fabulous cupcakes.

so, i know what i like-carrot cake.  i very rarely get a piece of it so when i saw the cupcakes, i had to have one.  we also came home with a wedding cake, chocolate, red velvet and strawberry.

as you can see, they use real ingredients-those are carrots and raisins.  and what looked like not enough frosting was actually more than i needed-but don't think for a minute that i didn't enjoy the freshly mixed cream cheese frosting...so if you're in the neighborhood, check them out and if not, make some and share them with your kids(if you have them).  trust me time flies and before you know it, you will be watching them fly away...