Eleven is one louder...

Another year just flew by...TC is now 11 years old! My child is a Tween!

Here are some unadorned mango cupcakes with cream cheese frosting crafted by the ever so charming and talented Jenny of Jennywenny Cakes (also of the blog Foray into Food)..

But wait there's more! See what they look like with toppers!

In addition to Harry Potter, Avatar the Last Airbender, Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, iCarly and the dreaded Justin Beaver, TC is also crazy about horses, hence these cute horse themed toppers. I loved the details on the red bandana!

At the party, TC and her friends (and the parents) loved seeing the different designs of the toppers. One of her friends did not know that the silver "U" was a horse shoe.

TC loved these cupcakes! They were so delicious and light with such creamy frosting. If you should ever have a special occasion coming up, I highly recommend Jenny!

There are no food photos from the lunch party. Unless you think that pizza slices from Pizza Hut are exciting (cheese, pepperoni, and supreme - thin crust if you're curious). 

One of my friends  (the Sexy Nurse) just got back from Napa this morning with her husband. They brought back a box of macarons from Bouchon. I miss these (although I had the NYC ones)! I forgot what flavor the lavender hued one was, but the rest were: Pistachio, Vanilla, Hazelnut (or was it Caramel?), Chocolate (which would soon be devoured by yours truly), and a bitten Vanilla.

This was the chocolate one...Ohhhh, so good this was!

Later that evening, we had our families over for a simple dinner at our place. TC is the only girl among five boy cousins, although only three were able to make it that night. The oldest nephew (14) is now taller than me! The youngest (1 1/2) is now walking and getting his hands into and onto everything!

Now onto the food! Bert sliced and arranged this watermelon. We had a shaker of that Mexican chili powder stuff you put on fruit (not shown).  I also made fruit salad (mango, raspberries, white nectarines, and quartered strawberries) which was also not pictured.

Salt and Pepper Fish from Mandarin (the once across from Southwestern College). Think of those saliva inducing Chinese Chicken Wings but instead of wings, it's fried fish nuggets! Addicting!!!! Crack from the sea! I also got seaweed salad (from Costco!). It was sesame flavored with a bit of chili flakes in there for heat.

Mixed greens ($1.99 bag from Trader Joe's) with two types of salad dresssing...

Here's a few more salads - Mac salad (courtesy of my mom) with diced red and green bell peppers, chicken, pineapple and grated cheese, along with that seaweed salad again...

One of my favorites - my mom's sauteed bittermelon with tomatoes, onions, garlic, and eggs! Yum!

Of course there was pancit because noodles = long life. I love my mom's pancit. She uses bihon noodles and includes: chinese celery, carrots, fish cake, chicken, and shrimp. Missing today was the Chinese sausage.

My mom made a dessert/beverage, kinda like the kind we had a couple of weeks ago at the one year old birthday party. She put in evaorated milk, gulaman cubes (red flavor and black grass jelly), lychees, and coconut milk.

Can you tell these were recycled candles? Heheh. Yeah, I'm "thrifty" like that. The cake was from Baskin Robbins (TC's choice): chocolate cake with chocolate mint ice cream. I haven't had a BR cake in years! Jamocha almond fudge anyone?

Should that cake be on Cake Wrecks? Look at that wierd squiggle design on the side. It looks like it says "Hell"! Wut?

TC's past birthdays:
2010
2009
2008 is missing because that was the year I was majorly sick.
2007

*Because embedding is disabled (damn them!), here's the YouTube link which explains this post's title.