Pastry Duplicity

A lot of the time I do the same design over and over and over. As such I tend to not bother to post photos of the same design over and over and over. June has been a really big month for the same designs. Let me show you.

I love polka dots.
This is actually a cake for the display case. I wouldn't be surprised if it was sold by Thursday when I go back to work. I also did one that is white with lavender dots and lavender roses on top. Sound familiar? Should, I've done that design many times before.
More dots! This is actually a cake for a wedding shower. The couple had gotten married a couple of weeks prior and the person who brought the wedding cake (see below) got such rave reviews she volunteered to bring the shower cake.
Polka dots! For an order.
I guess the little girl the cake is for is 7.
Stacked present cakes. I particularly love the look of this one.
Though this one is lovely as well.
Baseball has been a big theme also. I did three big cookies done to look like baseballs that I didn't photo.
The thing about this one is that the person who took the order took it WRONG. The trim and name should have been light blue. It's a baby shower cake. I had to carefully remove the trim and letters and re-do them in light blue. I wasn't a happy camper about that.
Another baby shower cake. I like this one.
And hate this one. It was exactly what the woman ordered but I think it is hideous.
The two hearts cakes have been SUPER popular lately. For weddings...
Anniversaries...
...
Showers....
More anniversaries. Luckily I do like this cake and really like it when I get to make it a wee bit different. (the reason the hearts look smaller on some of the cakes is that the cakes are different sizes)

Slip Of The Tongue

Said by my youngest as we watch Batman Begins.
Cabbage Patch: He was going to say the F word. How do you spell FUCK? *imediately covering her mouth*
Me: Don't say that.

I know, I know, that kind of stuff is going to get me nominated for mother of the year. ;)

More Cake

I'm quite behind on my posting of CAKE. No excuses, just no motivation. Tomorrow is a day off so I may actually post something... or maybe just more CAKE photos.

Cherry Blossoms.
Pretty coral and shells.
I found the sugar shells and just HAD to make something for them to go on.
This is my display wedding cake. I totally fucked it up while staking it. Twice, I fucked it up twice. Obviously I fixed it. Here is one side of it. I really liked it with out the roses but I wanted to add the red to make it stand out a bit more.
And this is the other side. I intentionally did each tier a bit different as this is my only display wedding cake so I really had to do what ever I could to get the most out of it. Also, when I'm tired of looking at one side, I can turn it to the other side.

Out Of The Mouth's Of Babes

Me printing a document.

Cabbage Patch: Are you printing money?
K: No that's illegal.
Me: That's IF you get caught.
Cabbage Patch: There aren't any cameras in here.

hehehe if only it worked that way honey!

65 mph Winds

Just before 11:30 am, the wind started blowing really hard and then it started raining, HARD. We heard a hard bump on the window that made my darling weather panicked Super Girl start doing her Chicken Little act. I told her to chill, it was fine as she rushed upstairs to look out her bedroom window and see what hit the window. I called Sarge to ask if he would call me if his weather radio gave a severe warning for my area and as I hung up, Super Girl rushed down the stairs saying "Mamma! Mamma! Mamma!" We peeked out the window and all I saw was leaves against my window from the tree outside.... the tree that's about 12 feet from my window.

The photo of the actual tree that broke didn't come out to well due to the wind and rain.
That's my window to the right.

I Don't Like Making Ice Cream Cakes

I only decorated a few cakes today. Two were ice cream cakes, which I just don't like to do. Why? Because I have to rush through them so they won't melt. That plus they are really, really messy.

The Taste Of Summer



Nothing like an Otter Pop on a hot summer day. In fact I think I like Otter Pops better than regular Popsicles. Mainly because whenever I buy the Popsicles, I end up with a million grape flavored ones, which no one in this casa will eat. Also, I buy the store brand 'Otter Pops' so they are WAY cheaper. But I digress... Go eat an Otter Pop.

Laundry

That's what I did today... that and go to the store with the Tiny Terrorists, met a friend at the park while the offspring played, came home to make dinner, do more laundry and paint. Exciting right? I intended to write something long and thoughtful but... it's my day off! So look at CAKE!

This cake just makes me laugh, because it's kind of stupid looking. It's what the customer wanted though.

Spooky Tuesday

I did a ghost cake today and it's not even Halloween! hehehehe! I have two days off in a row! Woohoo!

When WTF? Just Isn't Enough

Today a coworker called in to tell the store director that she was taking a month long leave of absence. No explanation just that.

Schedules shifting. Inventory tomorrow, usually takes two people to do... guess who is number two tomorrow?

WTF?

I have an addiction to fortune cookies. I don't eat them, I just like the fortunes. I have to control myself to not get 20 cookies at the buffet.

The Master is my work adviser.

He stands on the shelf and guides. Who knew he knew Kung-Fu and cake decorating?

Sunday

Nothing to say really, worked that's all.

Perfection Achieved

Not me, just today. Ya know the saying, "Hard work is its own reward", that is so true. I honestly expected today to suck monumentally, but I was happily surprised by it's brilliance. Let me drone on far to long and in far too much detail about it now. (Feel free to grab an alcoholic beverage or three to enhance this experience, go on, I'll wait.)

First it started far to early for it to be respectable and involved waking my offspring so I could drop them off at a neighbors house at an unholy hour so I could walk to work early. At end of work yesterday I had 21 cakes waiting for me, 25 when I arrived and probably 28 - 30 were actually done today. (That works out to be about $615 in cakes if all were cheap cakes but more like $985 - $1100 in reality.)

My initial plan was to photograph all cakes that I decorated today, but that quickly became a ridiculous idea as I focused on getting the cakes done quickly and working on the two wedding cakes (one was actually a Quinceañera cake, but I'll continue to refer to it as a wedding cake just to save myself from having to type that again) between orders.

Luckily I had help. Sarge's mini Jack decided to tag along today. Here he is inspecting the icing of a top layer for a wedding cake.
And later here he is being far to critical of my decoration. I had about all I could take of him as he wasn't being all that helpful, just critical and kept eating the icing. I told him I had some $$ in camera bag as well as an airline bottle of rum, then didn't see him the rest of the day. I didn't really have $$ or booze, I think he was just pissed at me after that.
The rest of the day went by in an amazing sugary blur. The store director provided lunch for everyone, he grilled hamburgers and hot dogs. When I had a moment I took 20 to go swallow one whole then got back to the business of CAKE.
I loved this cake. A movie themed party for graduation. My second to last cake, it's a wonder I was able to even write my shoulders and arms ache so much.
The last cake. Just turned out great.
This has to be my favorite wedding cake I've done lately. I love the simplicity of it.
I absolutely love how this turned out. I fretted quite a bit over this wedding cake. It turned out to be so easy. I enjoy the simplicity of the design and the rich color.

Upon dragging myself home 11 hours later, I went to fetch the offspring from the neighbor. She is far to kind, despite having been saddled with The Tiny Terrorists for 11 freaking hours she declined payment - luckily I brought her brownies which I knew she would not refuse if for no other reason than for the sake of her 4 wee progeny. She is also probably insane as she took my progeny and her progeny swimming. 6 kids ages 9 years - 4 months, she took them ALL to the pool by herself.

I brought The Tiny Terrorists home and they promptly ate the hot dogs and hamburgers I brought home for them. The television was on, tuned to something on TLC, Super Girl watching in the living room with me and Cabbage Patch in my room as I read the news online. About 7:30 pm I noticed it was rather quite around here except for the television and realized that both of the Tiny Terrorists were fast asleep.
My head almost exploded from the sheer adorableness of them. Super Girl sprawled across the sofa with the cat and Cabbage Patch snuggled under my covers still clutching her favorite Pokemon, Piplup. Sleeping children are intoxicating. I wanted to breath in their fumes and press them both in a book like flowers. I know tomorrow they'll be back to their normal selves, rolling their eyes when I tell them to stop something, picking on each other and just in general being KIDS, but tonight they were angelic. They finally roused a bit when it was nearly 9 pm. I sent them to bed a quarter after 9 pm as they were still drowsy.

And now, I think I'll follow suite. Good night good reader.

And Friday Felt Like Saturday With A Kick In The Nuts!

Oh Damn I'm tired! I worked until nearly 6 pm today. A whole lot of cakes. Tomorrow is going to be brutal. 21 cakes as of when I left. 2 of them wedding cakes, one of those is 4 freaking tiers. What is this stupid trend of people to get married in June?

Feels Like A Friday, Sucks Like A Monday

All day I kept thinking it was Friday and would have to remind myself that it was only Thursday. Where to start... Let's see.... Graduations in my neck of the woods are tomorrow so I've got a LOT of orders for Friday and Saturday. I went in early to get a very early order for 4 cakes done, and I got it done, then DROPPED one of the cakes... right in front of my manager. Such a great moment. This is the second cake I've dropped in about a month. Luckily my manager doesn't know about the first one. Oh yeah and the floor freezer fucking broke. So I had to spend some time helping the manager take things out of there instead of decorating the millions of graduation cakes I have to do. I didn't even get to the wedding cake I have to do tomorrow. Oh yes, and K leaves in the wee hours of Friday morning to head to Austin for some political shit. I'm disgruntled about this. And only because this is the second weekend in a row he'll be gone and quite frankly I'm pissed and jealous. I was hoping to maybe go see a movie on Friday night... a movie that the target audience ISN'T 13 and under. I'm irritated my whole schedule has been thrown off for the past couple of weeks and well that makes me pissy. In fact I'm so unhappy at this moment that I'm shocked some random stranger hasn't had the overwhelming urge to hand me some Prozac just because. I kid, I kid, I am not happy, situations are making me frustrated but I'll get happy again. Doubtful it'll actually take psychoactive pharmaceuticals to help either. Okay, okay, must move along now, must not dwell and get sucked into a pit of despair because quite frankly I could go on and on but it's not going to change anything or do me any good and no one (including me) wants to hear me whining. How about some CAKE?!?!?!??!!! A graduation cake. I think it's lovely. This is actually a wedding cake. Ya know, the kind of wedding where they get married in a hurry and then plan to have a BIG WEDDING in a year. They used to be called 'shotgun weddings' and the BIG WEDDING rarely ever happens. No matter, the cake came out really beautiful, so much so that my boss wants me to print this photo and put it in the cake book for customers to choose from.

Home

Moving on, I'm a member of NaBloPoMo. This month the theme is HOME. A subject that's been on my mind quite a bit lately as my HOME status is subject to change soon - and for the good for the most part. But what to write about HOME. I don't really want to write about the HOME I have now as it's in a state of flux and to be brutally honest it's not at all what I WANT for HOME. I'm going to write a little each day (at least I'll try) about what I want HOME to be.

I want a little garden. I truly, truly suck at gardening as I tend to forget what I plant where and some how always get some alien plants that infiltrate my plants. No matter, I love, love, love having flowers. The photo is from 2004, I don't know what it is but it was really stunning. This is the second year in a row that the girls and I haven't planted flowers in our pots. Sadly I just didn't want to. As much as I love seeing my pots full of flowers and plants I had a bad case of "Who gives a shit" in the early spring so no planting. I regret that now and I miss the perennials that I had planted in front of the house we used to live in. Nothing brought me more joy than to see my irises and gladiolas blooming in pink and purple. I loved all the wild flowers that attracted butterflies and the tiny white flowers that valiantly tried to grow across my walk way. I also loved using the weed whacker! I never wanted to MOW but wow, using the weed whacker was a total rush for me. I know the next place I'll move won't allow me the luxury of weed whacking or planting a lush flowerbed full of bright wild flowers but some pots of full of lovely plants will make me happy.

And that's all for now, must sleep.

Ch-ch-ch-changes

I changed my hair. Now before you go crazy and make comments let me just say - if you don't like it, don't tell me because I really don't give a crap. I like it.

Here it is curly.
And here it is straight. 4 inches shorter also.

Why? Because I wanted a change. I've had the SAME hair color for the past 20 years. One of the first times I colored my hair I colored it red, my mother hated it so I colored it black, which she was ambivalent to so I colored it something different every 3-4 weeks until I came to the red you are all so familiar to.

Not sure if I'll keep it or go back to the red, so far I like it... it's not permanent though so I still have some room to CHANGE.

Pretty Cake

Have Some Cake!

Did I say I would have time to post? HAH! I am such the comedian some days.

Zombie Offspring



That is one of my FAVORITE photos of Cabbage Patch. I took that photo when she was 3, right after she finished eating a bunch of fresh cherries. I thought it was just precious that she looked like a vicious brain eating zombie. So it should come as no shock when I admit that I let my progeny watch Shaun Of The Dead with me today. That has GOT to be the BEST romantic comedy EVAH! What? You don't think it's romantic? Oh but it is, the central story is about Shaun and his girlfriend Liz... and zombies... lots of zombies... mobs of zombies in fact. And because it was on TV it was cut to shit so I only had to tell Super Girl to cover her eyes once near the end. The censoring does make me wonder WHY 'wanker' was silenced though. I can understand Fuck and Shit and all that but 'wanker'? (incidentally, K was none to thrilled that I let the progeny watch Shaun of the Dead. Eh, whatever!)


Anyway... I'll post more later - WITH CAKE! - I know I've been a bit of a wanker about posting lately, but... fuck it's my blog and I've not had the time or inclination to post the inane ramblings in my head. But SOON! I will SOON! All the crazy is building up in my head and must come out! Coming soon! CAKE! Work Rant! Ex-Rant! and CAKE!!!

Okay, move along now... nothing to see here.

I Love My Job

Even though I'm totally swamped and I'm dreaming of CAKE. I have a cool cake to make for a retiring police officer this morning and that's ALL I've been able to think about since my alarm went off this morning.

CAKE!

Apparently this person likes to scrapbook.
Running theme.
The person who got this is going to put some Mario toys on the cake to go with the mushroom.
just pretty.
the stripes are actually purple.
Tiny cake!
Another tiny cake!
I love Hello Kitty!
So much so that I convinced people twice on Sunday to get a Hello Kitty cake.

Moving on... I'm a bad influence on my youngest. The other night we were watching Battlestar Galactica the second season, a scene comes up where Starbuck says "Bitch took my ride." Fabulous line. I chuckled about that for a while. Just this morning my sweet little Cabbage Patch said "Mom say the B word. Say what that girl said on that show, about her ride." I did and she was THRILLED. Now if I could only convince her that she shouldn't say piss.