Party train, continued!

Here's the birthday boy the night before the party~ showing us how old he's going to be!

I didn't want a "Thomas" party, but I had to get *some* stuff since Nova loves it all so much.

Cousin Kolby inspecting the cake~I got engineer hats and bandanas for the kids. Nova really didn't want to wear the hat. Party pooper.


Aunt Joyce's birthday artwork...

PIZZA!

We got the take and bakes from Sam's and I thought they were awesome!

Let the opening begin!

I told him he couldn't open presents unless he wore the hat... mean ol' mommy...

Here he is with Kolby, Aunt Joyce and Grandma Lucille~

Lots of great loot~ mostly train related of course!

The boys had a lot of fun. Here they are playing with Ramone's paint shop from Cars.

Can you hear them spray painting? Pshhh, pshhhhhhh! LOL~

One more look at the cake... I thought Nova would want the engine but he requested the caboose.

Make a wish!!

Ugh, black icing!

The destruction, I can't bare to look!

Ok. I had to post this. This was not planned. My dad asked for a piece with a tree. I cracked up when I saw it tho, and had to rotate the pic for ya...

(got wood?)

And guess who's feeling better? Yes, Miss Melly.... and she's giving me hugs.

Still more to come!! Thank you all so much for your wonderful comments on the cake, : )

P is for porcupine~

Have you ever been doing a project that was going so wrong, but you HAD to finish.... YOU JUST HAD to FINISH no matter what!?

Even though you thought you were going to DIE before you got through it?

Ugh.

This should have been FUN. Normally I would look forward to each step, yearning to see the outcome.

Not this time.

Hmmm... they look cute and innocent enough don't they?

Nova and his preschool class are learning about the letter "P" this week. Tomorrow is my day to bring snacks. So after being inspired by the critters in Over The Hedge, I thought how cute would that be to make porcupine cupcakes?

It'll be a CINCH thought I..... one of the quickest cake decorating projects ever.....

Just use a grass tip...

...and paint a few lines on the inside of the piping bag with brown food coloring so the quils would be variegated....

...Slap a face on 'em, and voila!

Hmpf.

Thank goodness these are for children, who will not care what they look like.... and actually, they're not too bad. But they are FAR from my vision.

I HATE making icing. I have dabbled in cake decorating for years thanks to my mom, but haven't made much icing. Mom always made it. I helped do a wedding cake in Home EC in highschool for a pretend wedding... but the teacher made the icing.

I don't know what I did, or didn't do. But I could not get the icing to perform for me. Perhaps it is just the grass tip, which I hope I NEVER have to use again. GRASS TIP SUCKS!!

At any rate, I wanted to break down and cry after doing about 2 cup cakes. And I had 10 more to do. (Thank goodness it's a small class!)

I seriously thought I was gonna lose it while working on the last one.

I'd rather birth 12 babies naturally!

My hands were shaking... It took over an HOUR, when I should've been able to knock these out in about 5-10 minutes! BLHAHAHAHHH!

I was dreading doing the icing beforehand and even asked the Walmart bakery if they sold their decorating icing in a tub. No luck. Phooey.

Anyhoo.... here they are. They're cute. They're edible. That's all that matters.

In this pic you can kinda see the variegation on the top ones (click to enlarge)

... the food coloring just did not "paint" on the vinyl bags, it beaded up. I thought I remembered the Wilton pro food colors to be more pasty, not slimy. So, would have to use parchment bags for that I suppose. Good thing I made chocolate cakes so they have *some* other color showing through!

OK.... after spilling my guts and crying on your shoulders here.... I think all I really needed was a large grass tip. Which... you will not find, in a little one horse town such as the one I live in. Ahh well, maybe next time.

Happy Mother's Day to the cake decorator "extraordinaire"

Here is my pretty and talented mom! This was taken at my brother's wedding a year ago~

























Here's a recent pic, my brother with their new baby. Grandma is very happy!





















I'm going celebrate my mother by bragging about one of her favorite hobbies; her cake decorating talent. (You may want to stop and grab a glass of milk!) She used to take orders when I was little, now she just does it for fun, or for people she knows. Here she's adding "Luna" the moon to my son's Bear in the Big Blue House cake from his second birthday.




























This is the Toy Story cake I was telling you about. I asked her to do Andy's room, it turned out so cute! The blocks are cake too, and the headboard is a cookie.




































She made this cowboy hat cake for my son's first birthday. Yeehawww, carrot cake!





























My wedding cake~ these photos don't do it justice













































My brother's wedding cake~



























A replica of my inlaw's original cake for their 50th wedding anniversary~ along with photos of the cake from their wedding day





























Here's the original!


















































My cousin's cake~ the couple wanted a very earthy/woodsy cake with fairies. The bride got tears in her eyes when she saw it! Ladybugs, acorns, leaves and wild mushrooms adorn this cake.


























A fall wedding cake~




























Her most recent cake for a western themed wedding anniversary~complete with edible barbed wire






















She also does pannoramic sugar eggs for Easter. I have my friend Becca to thank for this photo from http://bluebirdroses.blogspot.com/2006_04_01_archive.html as I don't have a decent pic. Everything is edible, even the bunny, chic, and birdbath. I always loved Easter time because I got to eat any critters that got broken! My dad usually helped do the bunny faces.




















Gingerbread is another art of my mom's. She has won a few prizes in contests she's entered. One was a trip to Florida. The chef that she beat was a sore loser and destroyed his own creation after the judging! The house in these pictures was a display at a contest and had been there quite a while by this point, so some of the decoration was begining to fall off. (People pick at them too!) See the stained glass window?