real painting?

My husband saw a canvas for sale at a liquidation store he was at and now that I had started dabbling in painting again he brought it home for me.

I saw and stared at that thing for days. See, I'm one of those artists that is never inspired by a blank canvas. Sure to play with paint or experiment with colors I'm fine, but to paint something "real", nope. I have to have something in front of me to paint - a photo, a landscape, anything.

I decided to just wing it.

canvas experiment

I bought another couple cheap canvases and inspired by my kids I thought I'd play with some acrylic craft paint I had.

canvas fun

I used to do a lot of painting and hadn't for years. When I saw a sale on some cheap canvas I bought it and it sat around my house for months. Finally feeling a little inspired, I took them out and invited the kids to have some fun.

I picked the colors but they made the art.

birthday cake

A family sister asked me to make a cake for her daughter's 21st birthday. Together we took a bunch of ideas from cakes her daughter liked and combined them into one. She also gave me a youtube recipe for Marshmallow fondant.

It was easy to make, but sorta not quite the fondant I would use again. It's spongy. I don't think I like spongy fondant. I think it tasted good - but she's my family sister. She's going to be nice and lie to me too!

sesame street

A bake sale was coming to work and it gave me an opportunity (and an excuse) to make something creative. I went through Bakerella.com for ideas and came across Sesame Street characters. I got the kids involved - their pops were eaten the second the chocolate dried. These are the ones that made it to the bake sale.

on a whim

Now that I've been paid...... I felt all professional and thought I'd try something challenging.

A purse cake is challenging. But I had no one to do a purse cake for........ then, a friend was having a birthday - YES

Presenting a purse cake.....

I can't vouch for it's taste (this same friend had made the actual cake for the Betty Boop AND the Hello Kitty cake, I just decorated them). She says it tasted good, not sure - she's a really good friend and would like to make me feel good :-)

got paid!

Someone at the Hello Kitty party thought I done good, and asked through my friend if I'd make a Betty Boop theme cake - for money!!!! Novel idea that was.

So... I tried my hand at Betty Boop.

Not bad!!! Actually was quite fun AND I got paid for it.

Then

The Hello Kitties were a hit at the party and someone asked me to make them some for their family - last name Cat. 20 more kitties later and I had more money in my pocket. whoo hoo

now that I know how

Taking my new confidence and ideas in stride, I then attempted my very first "gig". A friend of mine that saw and ate a cake pop chickie asked me to make a theme cake and cake pops for her neice's 4th birthday. The theme was Hello Kitty.

I must say, I like how they turned out.

forgot to take a picture

Bakerella.com has such great ideas for cake pops and I decided to try them. I made chickies, bunnies, planets (for the kids) and easter eggs.

Then I forgot to take pictures.

They were cute and tasted good.

one more time!

This time I made sure well in advance of the youngest's birthday that he had a chance to pick a cake and that I would NOT forget his birthday. Running with the food theme of his brother his ideas for a cake - in order - were:





1. a fish patty cake (individual cakes that looked like fish patties), I said no.





2. a cake that looked like a fish (no not a cute fish, a real dead fish), I said no.





3. a bunch of little cakes that looked like a tuna fish sandwich, I said no.





4. cupcakes








We settled on cupcakes. Now what kind of cupcakes I asked and the conversation then went





pirates - no





robots - no

dinosaurs - no

space - no





astronauts - no, mom, that's the same as space





hmmmmm, Ben 10?? YES!!!!





I found a bunch of really neat ideas, and settle on Ben 10's watch. These are the final product:

on my way

The next birthday, of course, we were determined not to miss. Once again, my oldest decided a food theme was in order. This time we searched for just the word food on the internet for ideas, and what is now one of my favorite internet sites popped up - www.bakerella.com. LOVE THIS SITE!!!!

My son fell in love with the burger and fries cakes that she had, and I'm willing to try anything once... plus the size was just right. Here is the result...

The burgers are cupcakes, brownies and icing, the fries are sugar cookies (ketchup is colored chocolate)

oops

The following year for my youngest's birthday.....







we forgot to have a party, and a cake, and missed it completely....


oooops


so we had ballooooons, gifts and an quickie family celebration, sans cake, a couple days later

spagetti cake

When my oldest had his first real birthday party (with friends not just family) I asked him what he wanted for a cake. He wanted a trick cake. We scoured the internet for ideas and came across a Spagetti Cake.

This is the result.

The kids faces were the best part of the day when they thought they had just eaten a meal, and were getting another one for desert!

The hardest part of the cake was all the piping for the spagetti. The cake was also HUGE! I'll never make that mistake again.

first attempt cake

This was my first attempt at decorating a cake for my kids. I had big dreams but it didn't quite work out the way I wanted. I poured melted chocolate into all kinds of molds I found that I thought would make interesting shapes for a monster truck. Non of them worked out very well. It wasn't until I took the picture off of the camera that I realized we had put the candle in the wrong spot - that would be why there is no motor under this trucks hood! I left a spot for the candle and forgot!