Rainbow Cupcakes for Valentine's Day!

Well, it's Day 5 of our countdown to Valentine's Day. We did the Mosaic Hearts, We Love Paizlee Day, some very disastrous hearts that involved crayon shavings, We Love Breuklyn Day and now Rainbow Cupcakes. I saw a rainbow version of these cupcakes over at Bethany Actually and I thought that they would be fun for Valentine's Day.

The ingredients are simple: 1 stick of room temperature butter, 2/3 cup granulated sugar, 3 large eggs, 1 tsp. pure vanilla extract, 1-1/2 cups of all-purpose flour, 1-1/2 tsp. baking powder, 1/4 tsp. salt and 1/4 cup whole milk. I used three shades of Wilton coloring to get the fun colors. I used a red and two shades of pink, but you can use whatever color and however many that you please.
Since this was a project with the kids, I had everything already measured out. I have found that this makes life easier. In a large bowl, cream together the room temperature butter and sugar.

I love being able to use all of Nan's little bowls. They make me happy. :)

Once the mixture is light and fluffy, add the eggs one at a time and beat well after each addition. Add the 1 teaspoon of vanilla. Use a good vanilla extract because you will definitely be able to taste it in these cupcakes.
Now, you will need to alternate adding your sifted dry ingredients and the milk. Start and end with the dry ingredients. Be sure to scrape down the sides of the bowl as you go.

Don't overmix this because there will be more mixing when you are adding the colorings.

And now you have cupcake batter. Glorious. Divide your dough into three separate bowls, pretty please.
To each bowl, add the Wilton coloring until you reach the desired shade. Since we are doing Valentine's Day, we wanted pinks and red.

Line a cupcake pan with 12 cupcake liners. Now layer your cupcake batter. As you can see, Maddux was in charge of the bottom, Breuklyn the middle and I was in charge of the top. I was amazed at how well they did. Minimal mess, maximum fun.

Don't stir or mix your layers. I picked up the pan a few times and dropped it back down on the counter so that the layers would level out, but I didn't stir them. Fill these about 3/4 of the way to the top.

Bake these at 350 degrees for 18-20 minutes. Mine took exactly 18 minutes. To check if they are done, insert a toothpick into the largest cupcake. If the toothpick comes out clean, then they are done.

Remove them from the cupcake pan to a cooling rack to cool. Aren't they pretty?

I was really happy with how these came out and the kids think that they are the bestest cupcakes ever. I agree.

I just made a simple buttercream icing with 1 stick of butter, 2 cups of sifted confectioners' sugar, 1 tsp. vanilla extract and 2-3 Tablespoons of half and half. I wanted the icing to be a little thinner than it usually is, hence the extra half and half. I needed it thinner so that I would be able to pipe it onto the cupcakes.

I spooned the buttercream icing into a Ziploc bag. Then I cut a small bit of the corner off so that the Ziploc bag became a piping bag. If you have a real bag and a large tip to do this the actual way, you can do that too, but my way has less mess. :) I simply piped the icing onto the top of the cupcakes, added some sprinkles and VOILA! Rainbow cupcakes.

I think you should make some too!!! Happy Thursday!