Strawberry & Chocolate Cupcakes and My Daughter's 5th Birthday!

I've been crying all month as my baby girl, who turned five on Thursday, is no longer a baby.  My husband and I are watching as our only child's girlhood emerges and contemplating about what all that means,...  for us as well as for her.  Anyway, it's a big milestone, of course, and we all have made many friends at her preschool that she will be graduating from next month.  Everyone will be moving on and going off to different schools for kindergarten.  So, we wanted to have a special party to celebrate and to spend some time with people we might not be seeing much of in the future. 
My home couldn't accommodate everyone we wanted to invite so we had to hold it at a restaurant.  I decided to make the cupcakes for the event.  My little girl couldn't make up her mind between strawberry and chocolate so we chose to make both. 

I used  two Martha Stewart recipes.  The first was her basic white cake to which I added strawberry puree that I made to the batter.  After I filled the cupcake liners, I pushed a slice of fresh strawberry into the center of each one, frosted them with a Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting (also made with the strawberry puree) and topped with a chocolate covered raisin.

Next I used Martha's Devil's Food  recipe, which I have to say, I was not really happy with.  If I could have done it over, I would have used Hershey's The Perfect Chocolate Cake recipe I've used in the past.  It produces a much richer, darker chocolate cake, I think.   I frosted them with a Chocolate Cream Cheese frosting and sprinkled  them with chocolate and candy covered sunflower seeds.  I think the frosting  and candy helped improve the cake quite a bit. 

The food and the cupcakes are important, but what makes a truly good party is good friends, which we feel we had in abundance.  It was a lovely day and my daughter was very happy. (She's the one holding the stuffed wolf cub) Thanks to all the friends and family that celebrated with us this weekend.  We love you all.  Have a good Memorial Day everyone. 

Recipes

Strawberry Cupcakes http://bit.ly/mIC0Vg

Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting http://bit.ly/c5DJxY

Devil's Food Cupcakes http://bit.ly/lZgGwp

My preference: The Perfect Chocolate Cake recipe
from Hershey's http://bit.ly/iY8JJn

Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting http://jcp.is/ksQ0Wh

I purchased candy toppings at Trader Joes.