Two Cake Attempts and my baby girl' SK Graduation

Here is an attempt at decorating a cake for a party that Madison went too.  Again, I had problems with my buttercream icing being too warm, and the decorations not holding up well.  I was pretty happy with my roses, because it took me a long time to get it right.  And although they are not perfect, they are a far way from where I started.  The colors of course are her favorite colors.  :)





Here is a picture of my beautiful baby girl and her teacher at senior graduation.  She was so proud, what a day.  I would love to say I didn't cry, but of course I was crying the minute it started.  I am such a lush :)

And finally, here is my last cake I made, I was pretty happy with it.  I made a 3 layer vanilla/chocolate sponge, with chocolate ganoche and strawberry puree filling on the chocolate layer, and a buttercream on the vanilla layer.  The flowers were all made by using gum paste.  I did them the day before, shaped them and let them dry and then put them on the cake after I frosted it.  Again, I found it hard to decorate with the buttercream as it was really warm :( ... I especially liked the gumpaste roses, they took awhile but there very nice to look at!!!

Beachday!

Well, after a few days in the house, the kids are having some cabin fever.  The weather here is HOT, HUMID and yucky and I have had no desire to go out.  Considering the past week we were gone from dawn to dust 5 days in a row.  It was nice to stay home for a few days and catch up on the normal household chores.  Anyways, today we are going to the campground for a swim.  I even put on my bikini 8) .... but whatever, who cares, I am wearing a bikini!!!  The kids will be so happy to have me out there swimming with them, they don't care at all, although she likes to say things like "You look nice Mommy, but your bums a little big...no offense"....lol....what a kid :)  The little guy still has a runny nose but I think its from teething, so I gave him some advil and he is napping right now.  I will take him out in the lake too, nothing like fresh air and sunshine to ward off any illness.  And depending on how tired I am at the end of the day, we may even take the 2 little ones to see a movie, they want to see Toy Story 3!    In another few weeks my little girl will be 6, and a week after that my little baby boy turns into a toddler and is celebrating his first birthday.  I think its time for another baby!!!  Right Trevor??????  Lets have one more PLLLLLEEEAASSE!!!  lol!!!

Canada Day

For Canada Day, we spent our time at my husbands family campground.  Trevor is a licensed pyrotechnic, so he is legally allowed to blow stuff up :) ..  I am usually a ball of nerves until the show is over as there are so many things that can go wrong with fireworks.  Here are just a few pics of the weekend.  I will post more, once I get them off my camera :) ... Here is me with my littlest Colton, almost 1 year old now :(  .. guess its time to have another one ;)

Ah....gotta love a man in uniform!  Especially when its my husband!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Family

These pictures were taken in June (I think).  Colton is growing so fast.  He just loves to stand up against things, and dance.  He is a lot of fun to be around.  He loves to tell me tons of stories too :).   When we go to the park, he gets really excited to go on the swing or to stand up against the climbing wall.  Madison loves to push him in the swing and tries to help out anywhere she can with him.  So cute!

Fathers Day Cake

So, I decided to give it another go, practice makes perfect right? Well, I decided to make a Strawberry layer cake, from a Wilton recipe and I made buttercream icing, from the Wilton website as well. And I made some chocolate ganache too for the filling. I did some chocolate covered strawberries too to top the cake off. I had made the Strawberry Cake before, but in 2 8inch pans, this time, I doubled the recipe and used 2 10inch pans.
The cake turned out too moist and the buttercream icing was too sweet. I used basketweave decorations as I wanted to get really good at it. Overall, it was hard to eat, icing too sweet, cake too moist :( .. the best part was the chocolate covered strawberries!

My Second Cake

For my second cake, my husband and I decided to be quite ambitious! Since we are avid watchers of Cake Boss, we decided to a 2 tier pound cake, with 2 cakes on each tier, square then cover with Fondant. We had some amazing ideas in our head, and since it looked so easy on the TV we figured, how hard could it be. So off to the store we go to buy our supplies, the cakes I baked looked nice enough and although too sweet, the buttercream icing I made also was good. Now here where I went wrong. I first of all, didn't put enough icing between the layers, which if you have ever eaten pound cake, it needs a lot of something between the layers. Second, I thinned out my icing using milk (poured by eye measurements and used my mixer to incorporate) and poured it on the cake. It was sliding everywhere. Then after about 2 hours, finally got the fondant on, it took that long to roll out and it was horribly difficult to get it to stay put and nicely smoothed out on top of all the mushy icing. I had purchased some edible sheets and had music notes printed on it for the top of the layers, and my husband did a hand made out of cereal treats to look like it was coming out of the cake. The cake ended up looking, ok, but it wasn't tasty, it was dry :( ... Ah well, only my second cake.

My First Cake

Well, for my birthday I got the Wilton decorating tip set, so I thought I would give it a try. Since my wedding cake was basketweave, I looked up online how to do this. I did it too! I was so happy, I did only bake a cake from a box, but I was able to decorate it myself. The only unfortunate thing was when I went to show someone the cake, the board bent and the cake dropped on the floor :(
Here is a picture of my first cake!!!

The Cake Bible

I recently ordered my own (YEAH) copy of The Cake Bible, and Rose's Heavenly Cakes, both books by Rose Levy Beranbaum. After reading several sites, and doing a ton of research and making some cakes that, well, were just OK, I thought these books might be exactly what I was looking for. So in few days, they should arrive and then I will starting baking. I also joined a blog called Heavenly Cake Bakers, where, twice (or 4 times) a month we all make the same cake and post our pictures and our results. I thought this was great, as it would give me a chance to make something that I might not ordinarily make, and of course another reason to bake :). I have tried a few different cake recipes and icing recipes, mostly from the Wilton website. They were good, but standard cakes. I am excited to read Rose's books as they sound divine!!!! I hope to one day open my own little bakery or General Store, and sell all the things I love to make. In the late summer, I start my canning and I can dill pickles, sweet pickles and both raspberry and strawberry jam. I also love to crochet and knit and quilt! I am excited as this blog will be a nice place for me to post my trials and errors and end results!!!