Round one.......

Making a Diamond Grid....

As most of you know who have viewed my blog we have not been doing any traveling since July/August. We will be making a sweep of thirteen east coast states sometime in February or March. It will only be a week trip but we will try to post something from each state if possible. On our agenda is Ground Zero, Statue of Liberty, Empire State Building and the Brooklyn Bridge in New York. Other points of interest will be Arlington National Cemetery, Smithsonian  Vietnam Memorial, Lincoln Memorial and other points of interest in that area. We will also be visiting Myrtle Beach and a few other places depending on how much time we can allot for visiting tourist attractions.

Anyways......the diamond grid. Since we are not traveling I have been involved making cakes, cookies and a lot of cupcakes. I have a baby shower cake to do shortly so I needed a diamond shape grid as I'm covering the cake in fondant and need the diamond grid for the design.

I would really like a professional grid but they can be pricey and with a little time and effort I was able to make mine for about seven dollars and fifty cents. It is also much larger than the 11x6 one I would have gotten if I had purchased one.  All that is needed is a sheet of acetate (plastic) a marker, ruler, food grade beads, and a good glue. Also if you decide you want to make one here is a tip which may be helpful, if your making a small 8x11 grid use a 1 to 3 ratio. Meaning go from the first mark  on the bottom to the third mark on the top (left to right). If you decide to make a larger one as I did I ended up using a 1 to 8 ratio. You'll have to  use a little math or common sense to finish out the sides but in all it's not that difficult to figure out.

This is the completed grid, plenty large enough to make my pattern for a 13x19 sheet cake.

A sad day in America

Our prayers and heart felt sympathy for all those affected by today's senseless attack on the innocent. Let's all remember to keep a diligent watch wherever we go. At all cost, fight for those who cannot protect themselves. All it takes for evil to win is for good men and women to do nothing, thank God for those today that took action in saving other lives from being destroyed.

Newest Birthday cake..........

Delivered today. This cake was a challenge to do, well maybe not so much a challenge, more time consuming. With over one-hundred and ten pieces to assemble, and that didn't include the cake. There was the molding of the tree pieces and flowers. Then each flower center painted (with food color) dried and then the stamens marked. The flat hummingbirds hand cut and then colored with luster dust, the butterflies hand cut and colored and then the hummingbird topper, all hand done. It was a fun little project and the surprised look of the birthday girl was all I needed to see to judge the success of the cake. The actual cake was also a hummingbird cake recipe which consists of Pecans, Pineapple, Bananas and a host of spices. It is very similar to a carrot cake but I like the particular flavors of this recipe. I have more pictures but haven't downloaded them yet. I'll see if I can get them up tomorrow sometime.

Winnie the Pooh and.....

Homemade "Hostess Cupcake"s too.
Just a quick update on the things I've made this last week. I also made Bakliva but did not take any photos. A friend requested a Winnie the Pooh cake so I made a double "mirror" image Winnie the pooh cake for them. I didn't have a shaped pan so I had to hand cut it. I think it came out okay.
The "Hostess Cupcakes" came out great, I used a Black Forest recipe for the cake portion and topped it with chocolate ganache and a vanilla buttercream swirl. They were  much like the "Hostess" cupcake but the flavors were much better and they won't last three years partially because they are so good and partially because they don't have all the additives.

Ski Birthday....

for me it was just the cake, I don't ski and am getting a little old to go snowboarding anymore. I had short notice on the cake but i did try to incorporate as much ski theme as I could, Skis, Snowboards and black diamond for the black diamond runs. Used cinnamon sticks for the trees and used my secret recipe frosting and coconut for the snow.