Purse Party!

Yesterday morning I hosted a purse party at my small house with Purses Galore - which can be found on facebook.
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Purses-Galore/121898875912

Because I like to bake for people, I made a few different things for the party:
Beer Bread & 2 dips
Easter Cupcakes
Mini-Cheesecakes
Secret Recipe Cookies

Tastefully Simply Beer Bread, Spinach Herb Dip, Paprika Garlic Dip
My sister-in-law is a Tastefully Simply consultant, so if you need anything from her, just let me know and I can give you her information.
I made the classic beer bread, but we've also made the whole wheat bread before.  The spinach herb dip is my favorite, and Matt of course likes the garlic flavored kind.  If you haven't made Tastefully Simply dips before, they are very easy to make - just 1/2 cup sour cream and 1/2 cup real mayo.

Easter Cupcakes
I had a box of white cake mix in the cupboard and some whipped frosting from Betty Crocker, so I decided to whip up some simply cupcakes but then decorate them for Easter.
I tinted some coconut green by putting some in a sandwich baggie with a few drops of green food coloring.  Then mix until evenly coated.
Top the cupcakes with some coconut, 3 jelly beans, and make a basket handle with Twizzlers pull-n-peel licorice.

Mini Cheesecake Baskets
2 pkg cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
2 eggs
12-24 Nilla Wafers
1-1/2 cups coconut, tinted green
36 small jelly beans
12 pieces pull-n-peel licorice

The decoration for these cheesecakes is where I got the idea for the above cupcakes.
Preheat oven to 350.  Beat cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla with electric mixer on medium speed until well blended.  Add eggs, beat just until blended.
Place wafer on bottom of each 12 paper-lined medium muffin cups.  I would use 2 wafers per cupcake next time, to give more crust.
Spoon cream cheese mixture evenly over wafers.
Bake 20 minutes or until centers are almost set.  Cool.  Refrigerate at least 2 hours before decorating.  Store in refrigerator.

The smaller cakes without the handles are the mine cheesecakes.

Secret Recipe Cookies
Once again I made my delicious cookies - recipe unknown ;)  If you can guess the secret ingredient I'd be more than happy to share the recipe... :)

The purse party was so much fun - thanks to everyone who came!  My mom and I had so much fun!