Learning Cake Decorating

I have wanted to learn cake decorating for a long time. Who wouldn't want to be able to make all those gorgeous (and edible) flowers?!

My mom, knowing this about me, gave me all kinds of goodies to get me started on my way. Thanks Mom!!!!

So, this past weekend, I finally got up the nerve to start. I was going to just practice on a plain vinyl cutting board but hubby said, "No, if you are making things with icing, then they are edible and we are going to eat them". Hmm

Thus, I had to back up and make cupcakes first LOL

I thought I would start out simple...I chose to try the shell border. I did pretty good with this. I mean, how big of a border can you have on a cupcake? LOL

After several bordered cupcakes, I decided I was ready to move on. Keeping the same tip...did I mention I am lazy and don't like to get my hands messy?...I tried my hand at rosettes.

Next came leaves. Who has flowers without leaves? Well, possibly me LOL I finally got the hang of getting the leaf shape BUT all my leaves have 2 tips...not the traditional tree-type single tip. Guess I need to practice more.....or tell eveyone that I pruned before they arrived!

Mary, who knows how to decorate cakes, is probably going to read this blog and die laughing! LOL

Mickey Birthday Card

This week my nephew turned 16 and being right on top of things like I usually am, I just finished making his card. Oh well, better late than never. LOL

Santa brought me the Mickey and Friends cartridge for my Cricut and I thought it would be fun to make a Mickey birthday card.

I made Mickey at the 4" setting. I then used the George cartridge for the numbers at 2.5". The diamond background is a stamp from Cards n Stamps stamped with Dark Peony Colorbox Chalk ink. I had a blast making this card. It was fun to add each piece and see Mickey come to life!

Here is a close-up of Mickey. Isn't he cute?

This is the inside. The car is called ToonCar from the Mickey cartridge, cut at 3" setting. I had originally planned on a red car but I had this metallic black cardstock on my shelf and thought it would make a very cool car. I was right. :-) So, we have a sleek black car with maroon seats....not bad, huh?! The sign post is also from Mickey. There are so many fun elements on that cartridge, more than just the characters!

Check out this car close up! It really does have a sheen to it!

Monday, I mail off the card, he should get it by Thursday and being a 16 year old boy, it will be in the trash by Friday LOL Oh well! Such is life. :-)

Altered Ancestors

A friend of mine is hosting an altered cabinet card swap in the BadBaby yahoo group.

The theme is "My Silly and Serious Ancestors, Real or Not"

This is NOT one of my ancestors but it IS one of my husband's. It is his great grandfather Frederick Furry, he was a baby when his parents made the trip across the country in a covered wagon.

Maybe it was those early memories of being rocked to sleep in a Prairie Schooner that created those pirate dreams LOL

So, here is my creation for the swap, I hope Grandpa Fred approves. :-)

Happy New Year!

So, here we are in 2009! I am truly hoping and praying it is better than 2008!!!!!!!

As you may or may not have noticed, I haven't been posting for a while. It was 2 weeks into November before I even remembered to change my header and get rid of that Thanksgiving turkey! LOL Guess I better get on the ball and get that tree taken down! :-)

I haven't been doing much art-wise. I spent most of December baking and shopping (as it should be LOL) I did however get one project done. I completed True Colors journal #3. The theme was Cool Blues and White (with one accent color if you want).

Since it was December AND we actually had snow on the ground for a couple days, I did a winter scene. I love this background paper! I found it in a clearance bin last summer and now I wish I had bought more as I used both pieces for this project. This book is larger than most, it is 12x12! Nice to get to work on a larger format for a change but I still like the small books better. :-)

First I painted the snow on the ground using acrylic paints, I did both pages at the same time so the snow would line up right. Next I paint the tree onto the background paper. I used a large fabric painting brush and pounced the tree onto the paper. After the tree was dry, I added snowflake eyelets all around with a large pewter snowflake for a tree topper. Then I glued the page into the book.

Next, I worked on the right hand page. I wanted to be able to add some sort of writing to that page. I wrote a little poem (poetry is NOT my strong suite!) and then dry-brushed on some large snowballs to hold the words. I used a fine line sharpie for all the writing.. Again, once all the paint was dry, I added more snowflake eyelets. Then I glued down that page into the book.

Finally I did some journaling across the bottom of the pages.....all done!

You can see the eyelets better in this close up of the left page.

Here you can read my attempt at poetry LOL