Ella is One!!

I have had a very busy weekend!  My son's birthday is on January 6th and last year, he was lucky enough to have his daughter born on the same day!  So, this year my daughter-in-law ask me to make their cakes.  Her only request was that Ella's cake be a rubber ducky, since she loves them so much, but I could do whatever I wanted for Chad's cake.  So, I went to Pinterest for inspiration!!  I will show you how I made Ella's cake today and will post Chad's cake tomorrow!

 This is pinned to my board "Inspiration"

 I considered just going and buying a rubber ducky to put on the top of her cake, but decided that I wanted to make one that she could eat.  So, off to the store and bought some "Gum Paste"

I have never worked with it before, but have watched cake decorating shows on the Foodnetwork channel and it always looked kinda' like working with clay or play dough, pretty easy right?  It's just a simple rubber ducky after all!  I was wrong!  It dries out pretty quickly, I had to constantly put a little vegetable oil on it to keep it moist and it got these tiny little cracks.  Plus, it was really hard to get it perfectly smooth.  The first time around I was gonna' make the body and the head two different pieces, but once I got them made it didn't look right, so remade it into one piece.  I also found that using a toothpick to smooth the edges of the beak and the wings into the body worked pretty good.  It was a lot more work than I thought it was gonna' be!

Now that the duck is made, It's time for the cake.  I knew I wanted to make it small, because she was gonna' have it all to herself.  The first birthday is always so much fun!!  I used the large muffin tins and cut off the tops of two of them to make her cake.  I also thought that whipped cream would be a better option for her rather than regular icing.  For one, it wouldn't be so sugary and heavy and for two, I thought it would look a lot more like bath bubbles.  I found this stuff called "Icing Spray".  So I piled on the whipped cream and then just sprayed it with blue icing spray.  I also added a few little gum paste bubbles.

Here it is!!

One last little tidbit on Ella's cake.  It flashed thru my head that I should wait to assemble the cake at their house, but didn't listen to that tiny little voice.  Got it all ready and headed over.  Holding it in one hand and driving with other.  Once I got there, my daughter and her family arrived at the same time, so I ask for some help carrying things in.  I gave this cake to my oldest granddaughter to carry.  We made it in the door and I hear Lexi say, "Landin!"  I look over and the cake was just a heap of blue whipped cream!  Landin had hit her arm and it fell!  I called my husband to bring the "repair kit"  More whipped cream and blue spray!  I cleaned up ducky and the bubbles and reassembled. 

Good as New!!

Happy Birthday Ella!  Nana Loves You!!

 

Lucky Enough to Live Here

Hello again!  An update on yesterdays post on "Salt Dough Ornaments".  The kids woke up and decided they needed to make more goodies, so I mixed up more dough and we made them thicker this time and used the 250 degrees for one hour method.  Well, they were perfect!!  No puffing up, no discoloration!  There you go!!

OK, I know I said the next post would be about the T shirt scarves.  I made quite a few of them for gifts at Christmas last year, but only made one style.  My daughter loves hers and actually bought a pack of T-shirts to make more, but in diffrent styles.  I told her I wanted to try out a few more styles so she gave me her shirts and I plan to make more to show you, so, stay tuned!

Yesterday, I took my grandkids home and it was the most beautiful day, which gave me the idea for this post!

I wanted to share my beautiful state with you!  This is pinned to my Pinterest Board "Beautiful Places I've been and Love"

We have had a more than average snowfall and, I won't say it too loud for fear that it will hear me, but the wind hasn't blown in a while, so all the snow is still on the trees. It's breathtaking everywhere you look, so I wanted to share just a few pictures I took on the short, (less than 5 mile) drive to my daughters house.

                                 This photo was taken as I pulled out of my daughters driveway.

This was taken on the road entering my neighborhood.  I get to see this view everytime I leave and come back home!  How did I get so lucky!!

I am so lucky to live in such a beautiful state!  When I was small, my Dad got a job working on the slope as an electrician.  Back then the rotations were three months on and one month off.  It wasn't the easiest life, especially for my Mom, since she was a single mom for the majority of the year, but we made it work and I especially loved the summers!  Dad would take his vacation time so that he was home for the entire three months of summer and we would hop in the motorhome and travel all over the United States.  I am proud to say that I have been to almost every State in the Union, the only states I have yet to visit are the ones north of New York state.  I will make it there some day for sure!!  This is a beautiful country and I encourage everyone to see as much as you can see!

Our family remained in Alabama for several years, but Dad kept telling us how beautiful Alaska was, so finally, they decided that the motorhome trip should extend all the way to the Last Frontier.  The plan was to come here and stay for the summer, then head back before school started again.  We headed north, not without incident I must say!  Back then the Alcan was 90% gravel, but it was an adventure I will never forget!  We made it to Alaska and never looked back.  The summer turned into a year and a year turned into 10!  The first three years we lived in two motorhomes that my Dad built a lean-to to connect.  Alaska has changed alot since then and over the years, one by one, my sister, then my parents and finally my brother all have moved on.  But this is and always will be my home.  When we have visitors come from the lower 48,  I sometimes get the question, "Do you ever take this beautiful country for granted?"  My answer is always the same, "No!"  How could I ever tire of marveling at the beauty God has given us to enjoy!  No matter how many times I look at a mountain, it is ever changing, the shadow, the seasons, the colors. 

The New Year is always a time to reflect back on your life and look forward to your future.  I am a very lucky lady is so many ways I can't even count!  I have my faith that grows every year, I have my family, my husband and I are still in love after 32 years and we love our family beyond words, we are not without our struggles, but I'm proud to say that no matter what any of us face, we face it head on and work thru it and know that we have the rest of the family supporting us and praying for us, no matter what.  I have my friends, who over the years always become family.  Alaska is a place where you take others in and love them as your own.  And I have my beautiful state of Alaska, the Last Frontier.  How did I get so lucky!

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Salt Dough Ornaments

Pin from my Pintrest Board
"Christmas Present Ideas"

Well, remember I said a little something about mishaps for our blog?  Guess what!  Happened, happened and happened!! 

Last night I got a new post all ready, believe me I'm not the most savvy computer person, so it took me a while, but I got it all ready, pictures and all, hit "Preview", 'cause, you know, you wanna' make sure it looks good.  BAM!!  My computer freezes up on me!  But, I had a sleepover with the grandkids and we needed to do a remake of the salt dough ornaments (explanation to come later), so I decided to wait until this morning to post.  The kids are still sleeping, so wish me luck and pray my computer doesn't sleep again too!!   Here goes!!

Ok, so, Salt dough ornaments.  I found several different ideas and the one above is one I posted to my Pinterest board "Christmas Present Ideas".  I thought these would make great stocking stuffers from he kids to their families this year.  After all, what parent doesn't love anything their kids make!  So I mixed 1 cup flour, 1/2 cup salt an 1/2 cup water.  The recipe said to knead for 10 minutes. 

I had my three youngest grandchildren here that day, so we put the baby down for a nap and got to work!  We rolled out the dough to about 1/8 inch thick and cut out 3 large hearts, 2 Christmas trees and 6 small hearts for our projects.  The kids loved it and there was plenty of dough leftover for them to play with and make their own creations.

The kids made hearts with their fingerprints onto each one.  For the small hearts Landin did his own, both of my son's girls were here so for the small hearts I had them each make an imprint of their fingers for each side of the heart to form one heart with both their fingerprints.  I used an old ink pen to make the imprint of the year.  We just baked the Christmas trees as is because I had other plans for them.

Ok the mishap part.....  I used a recipe that said to bake them at 325 degrees for 1 1/2 hours.  They all turned out a dark brown, which I didn't mind so much but they also puffed up, unlike all the pictures I saw others had made.  I assumed it was because I baked them too long. 

Also, after they were baked I painted the Christmas trees and had the kids put their fingerprints to simulate the lights, but because they were puffy the paint made them extremely fragile and they broke. Those didn't even make it to Christmas!!!

The hearts however were a big hit!  With the small hearts we made key chains for the Dad's, bookmarks for the Moms and older sisters and dated Christmas ornaments out of the larger ones!  The kids were thrilled to have made everyone gifts and everyone was pretty impressed with them!  The directions had said to seal them with a clear sealer, but after the Christmas trees, I was afraid to put anything on them, so I left them as is.

A day or two after Christmas, my daughter found out that they also make excellent doggie treats!!  She noticed her lab licking the ornament hanging on their tree.  She shooed her away, not thinking anything about it but left the room and came back to no ornament on the tree and somehow the small heart on her bookmark mysteriously had disappeared!  Maybe the sealant was for more than one purpose! 

I also ask my daughter-in-law if she liked her bookmark we had made, she looked at me with a blank look on her face and said, "what bookmark".  It must have gotten mixed in with other used wrapping paper and disappeared.  The kids thought maybe their dogs had eaten hers, but since the whole thing was missing rather than just the heart, I'm thinking not. 

So,the request was made that we do a "take two".  It sounded good to me, because, for one, they must have been a good gift if they wanted replacements and two,  I wanted to see if the temp and baking time of the first round was the reason for the mishaps.  So, last night, we had a sleepover and did some "redos".   This time we used a different recipe that said to bake at 250 degrees for 1 hour.  They weren't quite so brown, but they still puffed up.  Personally, if they are gonna' puff up anyway, I liked the darker brown.....oh well.

I'm sure we will try this again, either for gifts or just for fun.  I'm thinking next time around  I will try making them a little thicker to see if that makes a difference.   We will see, but overall this was a lot of fun for both me and the kids.  That in itself made it worth doing!

Talk to you soon, my next project is "T shirt scarves". 



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A Year of Pinterest

Hello!  I'm super excited to start on this journey with you!  I have always loved any and all forms of Arts and Crafts and recently found, and am now addicted to, the Pinterest website.  So......decided it would be fun to try out some of the projects/recipes/crafts/anything and everything and share my mishaps, and believe me there will be mishaps, and accomplishments with all of you!!

Now, a little bit about myself.  As I said before, I love anything Artsy and my New Years Resolution for 2011 was to start my own online Arts & Crafts business.  My friends and family have bugged me for years to make and sell my goodies, so I finally went for it and low and behold, I actually stuck with it and slowly but surely I am building a business out of what I love to do.  

I am a happily married lady of 32 years and have two awesome children and five perfect grandchildren.   I try to spend at least one day a week with my grandkids, we have affectionately named it "Nana Day".  They all love that I'm an artsy kinda' Nana and we try to do something creative as often as possible, which will fit perfectly into our new blog!!

Oh, I'm so excited!!!  This is going to be so much fun!! 
More to Come!!
Have an awesome and safe New Years Eve and we will talk again next year!!  WOW!!