I have a confession to make, while I like cooking I am not a baker. My baking consists of opening a box and getting annoyed if I need to add egg or oil! So when my girlfriend Summer asked if I wanted to bake cupcakes from scratch, I said yes. Then thought, what did I get myself into? Since we live long distance from each other, she assured me we could do the baking together via phone, I could ask all the silly questions I wanted.

So last Saturday, we made Ina Gratens Pumpkin Cupcakes with Maple Cream Cheese frosting { recipe here} , Summer saw the Recipe in last month's House Beautiful Magazine. Here are the cupcakes we wanted to make yum, huh.

We did a little shopping and gather our supplies for baking, since I'm a dork I asked my friend to take a few pics and I would too. Here's our set ups, I opted to use my table so I could sit and chit chat (plus my counters are really offensive! lol)

Mr. CLH house lovingly went to Starbucks and got my a hot cocoa, didn't you know drinking a Starbucks is part of the baking process! We we opened our cans of Organic Pumpkin Puree, we were amazing how amazing how fresh the pumpkin smelled. I love how pretty the color is, it felt so fall. We mixed are ingredients per the recipes instructions. I proceeded to ask silly questions like: I don't have Extra Large Eggs? Should I use Three normal eggs anyways? Summer laughed and said two would be fine.

She has a fancy mixer, I had to use my own hand to mix! Oh how I need to add a mixer to my wish list this year, maybe Santa will bring me one. Doesn't the mix look amazing already.

Next up, we got our cup cake pans out and began the process of pouring, we opted to ignore Ina (sorry Ina) and make 12 cupcakes instead of 10 like the recipe suggested. While the cupcakes were baking we were going to start the frosting when I realized I didn't have any unsalted butter, I had to run to the store and buy the correct butter. Not to self, make sure you have all the ingredients next time, then I realized baking is a little like DIY projects, you think you have everything then you realize you have to make a trip to Lowes!

When I got back we started on the frosting, the oh so yummy frosting. I was so surprised how easy homemade frosting is. It only requires a few stuff (who knew?) I mixed my frosting forever, see I really need a mixer, I had to ask for help from the Husband to give me some arm power

Look how creamy and yummy Summer's frosting looks, nice and smooth. Love her Rachael Ray spatula, I want some teal blue of yellow ones. That would make frosting even more fun.

Next I chopped up a Heath bar to go on-top. When I was a kid I never ate Heath Bars, I didn't care for the toffee, now I know maple + heath bar = heaven!

Summer was able to find a Heath bar so she used a Symphony Bar, yum. Know thats's a candy I used to love my mom buying for me as a treat.

Drum-roll please, here's are lovely cupcakes. I was having odd lighting issues, but these cupcakes are so good a for sure new fall treat!

Love her presentation, aren't those little leaf dishes so adorable. She found them at the Dollar Store, I'm so buying some for Thanksgiving giving and painting them white, you all know how I love white dinnerware :)

I found so much fun talking and laughing with my girlfriend it was so much fun to be walked baking since I've never attempted to make cookies, cupcakes & cake from scratch. I highly recommend teaming up with a friend via the phone or in person to tackle a recipe that's out of your comfort zone. The results will be delicious.

Just in case your wondering withing 2 minutes of the pictures being taken at my house, three cupcakes went missing!

Are you a 'Box Baker' or a 'From Scratch Baker?

I've had a thing for grey stripped fabric for quite sometime. From pillows to drapes, I can't get enough. It's one of the those timeless looks that I love any room. I wanted to add some grey stripes to my sons bedroom Super Bad.

{ via here }

{ via Cote De Texas }

So I started hunting for grey stripped fabric, and kept coming up empty handed, until I looked on Fabric.com under quilting fabric. Over the recent yeas quilting fabric has become more modern, so I crossed my fingers. I found the perfect Grey Stripped Fabric from Micheal Miller called Two By Two. I thought it would be the perfect fabric for drapes in my sons bedroom. Remember his Tween Bedroom Redo, yeah i'm still slowly working on it and hope to have his room completed soon. Here's the fabric on his desk, I love thats the grey stripes are darker than his bedroom wall, I also got Tabari's approval on the fabric!

He and I have discussed changing his bedding I originally bought months ago from JC Penny's sadly the comforter set faded (bad!) looks like we've had it for years. We'll keep it and use it for his company when he has friends over. So we made a trip to Ikea and found a potential duvet set. I liked another set better, but its his bedroom, lol. I do like how the open circles look with the stripe grey fabric.

Originally his bedroom color scheme was grey, navy blue and red.At this point, I'm not sure how I like the limy green and red? I plan on making the drapes this weekend and going from there.

What do you think the grey striped fabric, are you a fan of it as well? What do you think, nix the red?