Chocolate Dragonflies and Cookie Lily Pads

Sierra wanted a dragonfly cake for her birthday. We planned to celebrate at the nature center. I've always tried to take advantage of having a group of homeschoolers to help sing in my children's new year. I figured I would go with the dragonfly theme and suggested lily pads for the critters to rest on. Sierra also enjoyed the class on mushroom identification, so maybe I should put a little "dirt" on the cake with mushrooms popping up.

It took me three days to put this all together. I needed to have extra cupcakes, since we never know how big a group will come to the class. I needed to bake cookies for dirt, mushroom caps and lily pads. I wanted to make lily flowers as well, but my cookies did not cooperate. No problem. It is still early in the year for water lilies. I needed to make dragonflies as well. I decided to dip pretzel sticks in chocolate for bodies and the wings were simply chocolate. Simple is always good. Considering how much I was running around while trying to make and assemble the cake, I was satisfied with the results.

 You can't see it from this angle, but the mushroom caps are set on mini cupcakes. Below are the extra cupcakes, each with its own dragonfly. Next time I might opt for just cupcakes if I have a large group. It's simply too time consuming to cut pieces for everyone.

 After the cake, we hiked up to the quarry with a couple of Sierra's friends. I thought it was a nice way to finish the day.