Angry Owls? And Expensive Cakes.

If you're on Pinterest, I'm pretty sure you've probably seen owl cupcakes that look like this (photo from
sixsistersstuff.blogspot.com)

Aren't they absolutely adorable? I thought they would be perfect for the Officers Spouses' Club Dessert Auction.  I wanted something cute but different that would bring in some bids (proceeds go to decorating the Children's wing at Portsmouth Naval Hospital for Christmas and also to make holiday boxes for Seabee families in need.) 

So I bought the Oreos (gasp!) and the M-n-Ms, and spent way too much time splitting the cookies.  Newsflash:  they don't come out all pretty white.  There are flecks of brown cookie in the filling, and no matter how I tried to scrape them off, they wouldn't even come close to being clean white.  I've read that microwaving a couple cookies for a few seconds might help, but only after I'd already split them.  With two other cakes to bake, I didn't have time to waste.

In the end, this is what mine looked like:

They actually don't look as nice in real life.  And after sitting overnight, even in an airtight container, the Oreos got really soft, so it was almost impossible to plate them up without having them break.

Needless to say, this is going down in my book as a Pinterest fail.  But I was hoping some kid would love them and beg their parent to bid, and it's for a good cause, so they went to the auction, anyway.  The dozen of them sold for FIFTY BUCKS!

I also made my two favorite cakes in this whole world.  I first made the  M-n-M cake several years ago for my Bookclub.  We read "The Sugar Queen" by Sarah Addison Allen, one of my very favorite authors.  If you scroll down THIS page, you'll see us in all our glory on the book website!

Here's the one that actually got auctioned.  That there is two full bags of M-n-M's on top and almost 4 packages of the large KitKats around!  It sold for ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS after a nice little bidding war!!!!

Also, I used my beehive pan to make the Irish Cream Cake that is absolutely amazingly wonderful.  It's always a pain to 'attach' the halves together, but I think it came out pretty cute.  This one sold for 'only' EIGHTY DOLLARS!

And now I hope I am done baking for awhile.  Amen.