Alice - EAT THIS!

This is what I have been working on this week. My friend's daughter turned 11 and she took a bunch of girls to see Alice in Wonderland the movie.

I get most of my inspiration from the party theme and then I go search on Cake Central. This was no exception. This is the original cake. I'm pretty proud of this cake, I really like the way it turned out and this is only my second topsy turvy cake.

The cake is banana with chocolate ganache filling and icing, covered by fondant. Everything on the cake is edible.

I hope you enjoy!

Skecher's Shape-Ups

Recently I got a pair of Skecher's Shape-Ups. I had been looking at them for a really long time and I finally broke down and got some. I LOVE THEM!! *I am in no way getting paid for this!


What I really like about them is that I can wear them all day and they don't hurt my feet. I have also noticed that my back doesn't hurt as much either. As far as the actual "shape up" part of them, I'm not so sure. My husband says that I look smaller from the rear if you know what I'm saying - but he could be lying (I think he might be). I'm not working out in them, I just wear them as you would any tennis shoe. I have walked around in them quite a bit and still no foot pain and I have stood in them working on cakes and no back pain!! As far as I'm concerned by butt can stay big as long as my feet, legs and back don't hurt!


This is a picture that I borrowed off the website to show you which pair I got:

You can go online and read all about the Shape Ups, the different styles, what makes them work, how they are built and how much they cost - here.

If you get a pair or have a pair - leave a comment and let me know what you think of them!

Fabric, Fabric Everywhere!!

First I would like to say SORRY for the terrible quality of todays pictures - its ok, you can say it - they suck!


My favorite fabric store is going out of business :( . I am so so sad about this! She is having a huge sale to get rid of everything and I stopped in the other day. I'll admit when I went it I really expected only to find some "filler" fabric left - but I was WRONG!! All the fabric that I have been eyeing for MONTHS was still there! So, I stocked up! Here is what I got:

LOVE THIS!

SO CUTE!

These are my favorites!

MOO Cows!

All the farm animals - how cute is that pig!

I'll admit that most of these fabrics I bought with MacKenzie in mind - but these! These are all MINE!

I know a special friend having a baby girl!!! HINT!

Stay tuned for some super cute items made from this super cute fabric!!!! Simply Sew, I will miss you, your fabrics and all your wonderful sewing tips!! Thank you for everything!

Monday Night!

This was MY Monday night:

Eating:

Drinking:

Watching:

Cheering on:

Sharon Zambito of Sharon's Sugar Shack and SugarEd Productions! One of THE BEST cake decorators and Cake Decorating Teachers EVER! She Rocks!!

Watching it right now - hope she wins!!!!

Jonah's Birthday Cake

I'm a cake decorator. (In case you didn't know). It's not something that I do for a living, just something that I love to do. Recently I had the chance to go to North Carolina and do a super special birthday cake for an incredible little boy.

Jonah was born with Junctional Epidermolysis Bullosa (JEB). He just celebrated his first birthday and oh, what a party it was! You can read all about the party and all about Jonah on his mom's blog here.

This cake was made to feed about 280 people and without the help of a friend who also does cakes, I don't think I could have pulled it off! So - Joanna - THANK YOU!!!

The party was a county fair theme and she had the venue FULL of carnival games and popcorn and cotton candy and all the fair type food you could have, tons of prizes and face painting and balloon animals and even a petting zoo outside! AMAZING PARTY!! Patrice I think you missed your calling as a party planner!

To go along with the "fair" theme, I made a fair cake, complete with bumper cars, a roller coaster, some petting zoo animals, white picket fences, games and fair food topped off with a giant box of popcorn.

Everything on the cake is edible and everything is handmade - did I mention my awesome friend Joanna?!?! yea - she made most of the little pieces on the cake, like all the games and all the food ect... all handmade by one amazing caker!

This is the bottom tier of the cake. Measured 14X28 and was vanilla with vanilla buttercream.

The top tier was the popcorn box, hand carved and was a white chocolate lovers cake.

The second tier was a 9 inch round carrot cake with white chocolate cream cheese icing.




The "petting zoo" tier is 12 inch round triple chocolate cake with vanilla buttercream.

All of the tiers are covered in fondant and the whole cake weighed about 75lbs! That was one BIG OLE cake!

You can see some of my other work on my Facebook Fan Page.

It was such an honor for me to go and make this cake for Jonah. He is just so adorable and his mom (Patrice) has done so much to raise awareness for EB - she is just amazing!

Wanna know the coolest part of his party? They had an online auction to raise money for DebRA.org - which is the organization that offers support to families with EB and is working toward a cure for this horrible disease. Head on over and check them out!

On a side note - if you are ever going out of town on an extended trip and are looking for something more than just a "hotel" but don't want to spend the $$$$ on a condo - check out the Residence Inn by Marriott. We had a 2 bedroom unit. It had a full kitchen and a living room. Seriously, I think it was bigger than my apartment in college. You can't beat it for the price! (no, I'm not getting paid in any way for that review! Just thought it was a great deal and one I certainly didn't know about until this trip).

Ok - so as promised, I have posted 3 of the 4 posts that I mentioned before. The next one to come will be all about making the perfect decorated sugar cookies! Tips and tricks to make them AWESOME!!!

Janel

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My Craft Room

A while ago I paid a personal organizer to come in and do some work in my home. You see, I was born without the organization gene. Before she helped me rework this room it will full, and by full I mean you couldn't even walk into this room, of junk that never got unpacked.

So, we worked and worked and worked for DAYS on cleaning and organizing this room. I thought that I would give you a run down of what we did - basically, I want to give you a mini tutorial on what I learned while organizing. (ya know - share with you what cost me a small forture - WELL WORTH IT THOUGH!)

This is my craft room. The big desk was given to me by my dad after he retired - I LOVE IT! It gives me several different work areas.

The space right in front of the window is where my sewing machine goes - when I took this picture it was in the trunk of my car so that I could go to my sewing class.

The space to the front of the desk is open for whatever - scrapbooking, painting, cutting or pinning fabric - you name it!

This is the "office" area - where the computer goes and faxes get sent and bills get paid etc...

This is my printer and my bookcase. The bookcase is full of all kinds of books - I'm a bookaholic. I LOVE books! Underneath of the printer is a basket full of "printer stuff". Misc. cords and extra ink cartridges.

LOVE THE BOOKS!

This is also another multi purpose work surface, but mainly this is the scrapbooking area. Those baskets are full of the most used scrapbooking tools and some pictures that need to find their way into a book!

I also use this space for cutting and pinning fabric and planning out projects etc.

BEHOLD - the craft closet! This is the uber-organized craft closet where all my supplies are kept. Sewing, scrapbooking, general crafts, glues, glitter, fabric, paint etc.... all in this AWESOME closet - all labeled and easy to find! Best of all - its easy to clean up because you KNOW where everything goes!

Look at those labels - how awesome is that!!

This is where the tiny stuff is stored - all seperated into tiny little containers inside these drawers.

Best way to store ribbon EVER!!! and organized by color - SWEEEEETTTT! (there is actually another row of ribbons behind these - I really like ribbon too!)

Thats all my fabrics up there - again, organized by color and some are in a "seasonal/holiday" bin.

All my scrapbooking embelishments organized by theme.

So if you want to do this to your room or closet or crafting space here are a couple things that I learned.

1. If you are like me you get a little overwhelmed looking at "the big picture". Pull one box at a time OUT of the area that you are working in and deal with just ONE thing at a time.

2. Only work for 3 to 4 hours a day - any more than that and you will get burned out and lose focus.

3. Sort, Sort, Sort - use large bins or boxes to sort your stuff into categories by craft as well as things to donate/sell and things that are trash.

4. Sort, Sort, Sort - I know - more sorting! Sort each of your categories by either color, theme or size depending on what category you are sorting.

5. Find things to use to organize your space. Desks/tables/shelves/storage totes etc.

6. LABEL EVERYTHING!

I hope that this helps you to organize the space that you have. I cannot tell you how this has cleared my mind and made my crafting easier. My favorite part is how easy cleaning up is - takes like 15 minutes! seriously!

What are you waiting for - GO SORT!

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Whimsy Couture Pattern Tester

Have you ever been to Whimsy Couture's Blog? Etsy shop? Really - you need to go! Her stuff is SO CUTE!

So recently she put up a request for some pattern testers, obviously I JUMPED at the chance to test her new pattern for a pillowcase jumper. (kinda like a pillowcase dress - but WAY CUTER!)

So here is my finished product modeled by the one and only MacKenzie! She is totally ready for spring - now, we're just waiting for spring to get here. (how wrong is it that she had to wear mittens to school this morning - we live in FLORIDA! seriously!)

So here is Miss Kenzie in the finished prduct front view:

Gettin Sassy!

Check out the rear!

Super cute! I'm thinking about heading off to JoAnn's to buy some fleece to make her one to last until Spring decides to show up!

Enjoy - and please head over to Whimsy Couture and check out her awesome patterns at her etsy show and some great tutorials on her blog!