Ella's 3rd Birthday

Hello everybody

Iggle Piggle and Upsy Daisy

Wow it's been quite a while since my last post - cannot believe how fast time is going - it's just slipping past me! I've been very busy lately and haven't had a chance to update either of my blogs. I will start this post then with a big Happy 3rd Birthday to my niece Ella. Her birthday was just over a week ago now but we only had her party on Saturday just gone.

Upsy Daisy 

It wasn't a big party, it was a nice celebration meal with the family - there was Mike and Kirsten with Ella and Isabelle, my mum and dad and Kirsten's dad, step mum, grandma and sister so there was a good crowd of us at the Carvery in Widnes.

Ella looked very pretty in her red dress with white spots on (I'm sure it belonged to Minnie Mouse lol) and she even had sparkly shoes (I was jealous) and a tiara - no mistaking the birthday girl!

In honour of Ella's birthday and also my newfound skills in cake decorating - skills might be taking it too far, maybe let's say because I have been attending cake decorating classes, I thought I should try and be a little adventurous.

The finished cake

We had learned how to make teddy bears out of marzipan and I had originally decided to make use of this new knowledge and attempt a teddy bear's picnic birthday cake. I'd drawn it out and everything - do 2 teddy bears on a picnic rug with a variety of picnic goodies. The icing would be green - for grass of course and there's be lots of nice flowers etc surrounding them. Then Michael started sending me pictures of really difficult cakes, mostly In the Night Garden, saying how much Ella would like them. At first I was very much against trying - far too advanced for me - but I slowly started to come around to the idea of giving it a go. It wasn't so much Iggle Piggle (apologies for those who don't speak child) that was worrying me, it was Upsy Daisy. Now those of you who have seen the programme (I sympathise) then you will realise just how colourful she is with stripes everywhere and all sorts of interesting clashing colours and stupid things sticking out of her head!

In the Night Garden

I did my best on this cake and I think it came out ok (though I am still of the opinion that In the Night Garden is too advanced for me lol) and Ella recognised who the characters were so I was happy about that and that was all that really mattered anyway. Half the cake was devoured by the time we left the carvery so I'm hoping that means they enjoyed the taste of it! All the characters were made of marzipan and the cake was covered in sparkles so that's not surprising really :p I do feel there are still plenty of things I need a lot of practice at such as symmetrical writing, making characters sit up properly on the cake without looking like they're about to topple off and also I can see some issues with how I covered the cake, but all in all I was happy with the overall look of the cake.

So anyway, I hope you like the look of this cake and take a good long look at Upsy Daisy as I don't intend on making her again!

The finished article!

Cake Decorating Class update

Hello all

I can't actually remember what my last post was on this and whether I'll miss any weeks out but I'm going to tell you about the last 2 weeks.

The week before last we made a little novelty, ideal for Mother's Day or as a little gift to give someone for their birthday. This didn't actually involve cake in any way. We made a Pot of Primula's. I had to google what Primula's were - I mean I guessed they were flowers but I'd not heard of them before. Apparently they are from the same family as primroses and come in all kinds of colours.

This little novelty was quite simple to make and looked pretty effective. We were instructed to bring a walnut whip and sugarpaste, along with a bright colour, green colour and terracotta colour. I could do the first 3 things but I don't have the colours to make terracotta but the teacher had these available on the night.

Here are a couple of pictures of the finished product.




Last week we made an Easter novelty - a duck in bed :)

For this we were required to bring in an Easter egg, a creme egg, some buttons and plenty of sugarpaste with yellow and green colours and also another colour for the duvet cover. I really enjoyed making this novelty gift and feel there was much scope for differing the design.
It did take a fair while to make this but there was quite a long session where we sat and watched the teacher make it and then we had to go and follow her instructions. We used one half of the Easter egg for the 'bed' and the creme egg was used as the duck's 'body' beneath the duvet. The egg was filled up with buttons and then the duvet cover was placed over most of the egg and covered the creme egg and buttons. A pillow was also made to place the duck's head on, all of which were created with sugarpaste. Although I imagine should someone prefer, marzipan could be used in place of this.

I decorated my (too large) cake board with the moon and stars but there's so much more that could be done - slippers, book, anything really. Also I think a rabbit would be a cute change to make and also Easter-y.
I took my novelty into work and gave it to Karen for her daughter Emily and used this "prototype" to send an email around work to ask if anyone would like one for any friends or family etc and to date I have 7 to make for Easter, for 3 orders and I also have one to make for Ella also! Lots to do, I'll be busy that weekend before Easter. To do this though, I still have a few bits to buy - I need the smaller cake boards and also a roll of cellophane, both of which I've sourced on Ebay, I'm just waiting for pay day now lol.

Next week we'll be making another Easter novelty, possibly two so that'll be fun :)

R.I.P Jay

Told you he wasn't one for cuddles!

Jay, the best dog in the world, had to be put to sleep yesterday. He hadn't been well for a good few weeks now with trips back and forth to the vet every few days. They'd initially thought he had bronchitis but he'd get better on the antibiotics for a few days and then he'd dip back down again. They had thought they would X-Ray him yesterday to investigate his liver and lungs but it was decided that it wouldn't be kind to put him through all that, especially if there was nothing they could do.

I was at work when my mum phoned me to tell me and my lovely manager was kind enough to let me leave so I hopped a taxi to the vet and was so glad that he wasn't gone when I arrived, they'd waited for me to get there. I got to say goodbye to him and we were all there when the time came, talking to him, stroking him and he went peacefully. The staff at the Ark Veterinary Centre were amazing and so kind, they let us spend as much time with him as we wanted, both before and after. It was so hard to leave him and come home without him; the house just isn't the same.

We have had Jay since he was 7 weeks old - we got him from Freshfield Animal Rescue in August 1999 and we gave him his birthday as 29th June. Along with his brothers and sisters, he had been abandoned outside the rescue centre at 3 and a half weeks old. The day we went to visit the Centre, looking for a puppy, they were all in a big cage, tiny little things, all making pathetic whimpering noises. Although it took me a long time to actually decide which puppy to have, I think I wanted Jay from the moment I saw him, stuck behind the litter tray where he couldn't get out. As soon as I'd decided on Jay, he gave me a kiss under my chin, further clinching the deal.

I'm bored of all these photo's now!

Jay loved his dad and would follow him everywhere - at least until he took him to the park, and once there he loved nothing more than playing with his frisbee. Everyone knew him in the park because of this. He was very good at jumping and catching it in mid air. Everyone thought he was a beautiful dog, and he was - he was a lovely black and tan colour and looked much like a german shepherd, which we are convinced he was, at least in part.

However, Jay wasn't the most affectionate of dogs and I don't believe he really thought he was a dog. In most households with a dog, I'm sure common phrases heard are 'get off the couch', 'get off the bed' etc etc, well Jay wanted to be different and despite numerous attempts to get him to jump on the couch or bed for cuddles, he refused to, the only exception being when there were fireworks and we were trying to get him to go outside before bed.

Jay was a very intelligent dog and in addition to learning sit and lie down etc, we taught him to close the door. but Jay being the contrary dog he was, he would often just look at you as if to say 'do it yourself'. I always found the fact that he knew exactly what you were saying and what you wanted him to do, yet chose not to do it, quite amusing at times and frustrating at others, but I loved this quirk in his character.

Jay would bark at everyone who came to the door, postman, milkman, hairdresser, friends and family, and continued to do so despite the fact that they came to the house everyday or every week. He was a good protector in the case of making a deterrent noise but I reckon if someone retalliated, he'd run the other way, he was such a scaredy cat! He hated the wind and the thunder and didn't like being laughed at :-) As I said, Jay would bark at everyone and it took him a while to make friends with you, but once he did, he'd love you forever and you'd get big hugs and kisses whenever you came to visit and he'd never forget you. It was a nice welcome home after a long day at work.

Until the last few months Jay had been a boisterous ball of fun, always wanting to play, he loved the pudding ball and the Santa ball, and it's been so sad to see the decline in him.

Jay was 11 years and 9 months old when he died. I'm sure he's now somewhere in doggie heaven, barking at everyone, telling them what's what. And although I know it was the best thing for him, as he was in a lot of pain, I still wish he was here with me.

Birthday cake - a commission!

Wow, I can't believe how long it has been since I last posted - time has gone by so quickly and so much has happened! But I'll save that for another post.

I just wanted to post some pictures of the birthday cake I have made for a colleague of mine who asked if I would make it for her for which she bought me a little baking tray with teddy bear moulds on for me which was really lovely of her.
Anyway despite it being such a busy weekend, I managed to fit in making this cake - somehow! I made the cake on Friday night and then on Saturday I added the jam and buttercream and covered the cake in white sugarpaste and then today (Sunday) I finally decorated it.

I wasn't entirely sure how to go about decorating it at first but I decided to use the applique technique we'd learned in cake class this past week (I'll do another post on that!) but in order to do this, I had to go shopping - such a shame :p I'd heard in cake class about this place in Warrington - not far from Gemini retail park - but on the other side of the motorway and it's a very well stocked shop - I walked in and was like 'Wow' and spent the best part of an hour there. I needed to buy leaf cutters and veiner and also some flower cutters and some green dusting powder so I could paint on the vines.

One mistake I made when decorating, which I won't be making again, was that I cut out loads of flowers and leaves in a variety of colours but just didn't think about the sugarpaste going hard, so I had to be very careful when adding to the cake as they were no longer pliable, which unfortunately meant the decoration lost some of its 3D effect. I also made too many flowers and leaves so ended up throwing the remainder away which is a shame.

I'm also disappointed with how the writing turned out - getting things straight and symmetrical is not a strong skill of mine. I feel I am mastering the actual writing itself and the lettering is fine (well not bad anyway) but I'm struggling with the placement of the words and I'm not entirely sure how to rectify this. As you can see in the picture below, the top line needs to be shifted to the left a bit lol. Maybe it'll just be practice...


 Anyway I really hope Geraldine likes the cake, which is the main concern overall. Hope you all enjoy the photos as well.

Stylish Blogger Award

Wow thank you to http://cupcakesmile.blogspot.com/ for this wonderful blogging award. You should all read her blog, it's really great with some wonderful recipes on there!

There are four rules to taking part - thank and link to the blogger who nominated you; share seven things about yourself; award 15 new bloggers, and tell them you have done it (sorry but I'm doing 16, I like too many!). I will be passing the baton to:




http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/
http://lookuplookaround.blogspot.com/
http://lookatmydinner.wordpress.com/
http://scottstipoftheday.blogspot.com/
http://mabelandmack.blogspot.com/ 
http://www.merseytart.com/
http://mookiesbigadventures.blogspot.com/
http://grinsworld1878.blogspot.com/
http://haroldtheplatypus.blogspot.com/
http://blogyourstore.blogspot.com/
http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/
http://brightandbeautiful-caro.blogspot.com/
http://melissas1.blogspot.com/

http://natalieroberts1.blogspot.com 

http://simonwhaleytutor.blogspot.com/

http://mistakeswritersmake.blogspot.com/

Ok, the hardest part of getting this award is to think of seven things to say about myself lol, but I'll give it a try!

1. I have been baking for less than a year but I'm really enjoying it and I'm currently going to a cake decorating to improve my skills.

2. I have just moved out of home and into a houseshare with strangers! An odd experience but hopefully it'll be a positive one - I've only been here 6 days, but I loved being able to have my friends over and have fun with them in my "own" place :)

3. I am part of the science fiction and fantasy book club at Waterstones in Liverpool 1 which is a lot of fun and I'm reading a lot of books I wouldn't have even picked up - sometimes this is good but sometimes there's a very good reason I wouldn't have picked them up!

4. I'm doing a creative writing course at the moment which I have been enjoying, despite being very naughty and not writing much for a couple of months! Oops

5. One of my favourite places to just be in are coffee shops - especially Caffe Nero with their yummy soup! I find they are such laid back places with a great, relaxing atmosphere. It's a good place to write actually :-)

6. I love films and TV and even have a Cineworld monthly pass so I can go as often as I like for only one monthly fee. This works well for me as I like pretty much every film I see and I like most genres too. I'm most looking forward to the last Harry Potter film :(, scream 4, X Men First Class, the new Pirates of the Caribbean and Breaking Dawn part 1.

7. Wow this is hard! I have a second blog http://awritemess.blogspot.com which is all about spelling or grammar mistakes I come across in either printed or online publications including articles, adverts, emails etc. I'm always looking for mistakes now and can't stop looking for them!

Thanks again for the award and I hope I can live up to it

Birthday Cake

Last weekend my friends and I who live in Liverpool visited our friend Laura who is living in Rugby, as a surprise for her birthday. We managed to keep the whole thing a secret for over a month with the help of her husband Chris. Laura is always travelling up to Liverpool for our birthdays (well except mine :p lol) and our Christmas meals so we thought it was about time we organised ourselves to go and visit her instead.
Hannah and Andy went up the night before and stayed with Hannah's nan in Leicester and Becky made her way to Leicester also, from Bath the night before.

Me, Becca and Carol congregated at Sian's house and left in Sian's car at 8:30am so we could get there for about 11am. After a slight detour we eventually arrived and sprung on Laura and showered her with presents galore! And then headed into Leicester to meet the others

I had taken the previous day off work to bake a birthday cake and some marshmallow cupcakes. I had wanted to make a birthday cake that looked like ones you could buy in a shop and also use my new decorating skills (well skills is a bit of a strong word lol). So I baked the cake itself with no problems at all and even managed to cut it in half relatively evenly :) I put all the buttercream and jam in the middle and then covered the top and sides with buttercream like we had done in class the previous week and covered the cake with a large sheet of sugarpaste I had rolled out. Apart from a couple of little iffy bits and a couple of holes I had to disguise, it didn't go too badly.

I know Laura really likes marzipan so I decided to make the teddy bear again. It's amazing how things never quite work out how you want when you're not following a teacher and being given step by step instructions, but it wasn't too bad, though he looked a little drunk and he wouldn't sit up straight lol and I'd put it near the back of the cake so I could decorate in front of it and write Happy Birthday but it looked like he would just lean all the way back off the cake! So I did edge him closer to the middle which unfortunately created a bit of a mess on the sugarpaste. I used my cunning and cookie cutters and created some stars which nicely covered it all. I ended up doing 3 star creations dotted around the cake and I also did a butterfly. Again using the skills learned in class I did a sugarpaste rose which came out fine, I was happy with that bit! Haha.

I managed to find my steady hand and wrote happy birthday Laura on the cake - not perfectly but I was happy with it for a first attempt. I think it was mostly the bear I wasn't happy with - I just wanted him to sit up properly! Plus I'd somehow managed to make him super sized - a few too many McDonalds methinks! But despite all the issues I was happy with the overall look of the cake especially considering it was the first time I had made one properly, I'm sure I'll improve with practice. Speaking of which, a colleague of mine has asked me to make her a birthday cake which is brilliant! Looking forward to it already, I just need to think of a design!

I also made the marshmallow cupcakes which I have previously blogged about - see here.

Moving Out

Hello

I'm now all moved out of home and into my houseshare that I'm currently sharing with two other girls with a new guy due to move in in a couple of weeks.

When new year came I made the decision to move out and move on and it didn't take me very long to find a place. The house I'm in now is really big and can hold up to 6 tenants at any one time. I am occupying the only en suite bedroom which is nice :) no fighting for bathroom time! My room is nice and large and has amazingly fit all of my stuff in, with ease in fact. The house also has a huge kitchen, 2 living rooms, a utility room and a downstairs toilet.

Moving day happened to coincide with Valentine's Day. As I started to move all of my stuff downstairs into the living room at home, I did begin to worry that it wouldn't all fit in the new place and I was convinced we'd be spending the day making trips backwards and forwards, filling the cars up each time. However with help from my parents and my friend Sian, we managed to put everything into the 3 cars in just one trip so I was very pleased!

I have now spent two nights in the house and so far it's all good. My housemates are nice and sociable but I can also escape to my room for a little while with no guilt whatsoever which is fab :)

Anyway I think I will be happy here and hope this is the start of something new and exciting!