I was busy all weekend and busy again today, so no witty comments from me now, I just wanted to update on a new order I delivered to a (thankfully!) happy client.
The theme was a Victorian tea party for a little girl's 6th birthday, so I made dark pink and purple fondant teacups and flowers to rest atop miniature cupcakes her mother made. It's a small world, after all.
Is this the Serencooki?
Bungle in the Jungle?
(I WAS listening to Rush last night, so I guess they could be the {wait for it, wait for it} SerenGeddy set. Gah, that was bad.)
I don't know quite what to call them. But I do know that if you wanted more cute little plains animals, you'd have to go to Kenya (can you believe it? Forget Norway...more like Snoreway).
A friend called me up to do some cookies for her son's 1st birthday, and she sent me this photo of the themed set she was using. Well, I'd been secretly looking for an excuse to make some brightly-colored animals, so I of course jumped at the opportunity to make these.
Here are the inspiration animals. Let's be honest, I blatantly ripped them off.
After careful study of the source material (ie: looking at the printout while stuck in traffic), I realized that I'd have to make a whole set of cutters to get the shapes right, so that was the first order of business:
The lion is actually 2 cookies, stacked on top of each other. I didn't make his mane as its own cutter, I used an existing sunflower-shaped cutter and rolled it flatter. The giraffe head is also the zebra head, I just cut off the horns and changed the ear position a little bit after cutting them out.
So I got to work, and the hardest and most time-consuming part of this set was definitely the array of bright colored icing that had to me made and matched. The hippo alone has seven different colors, some piped on, some painted with a small brush. Yikes. (I'm not insane, really. My friends have started referring to it as OCDetail)
The kid's name is "Teagan," despite my husband's insistence that it is actually "Triscuit," so I made his name and jazzed it up with yet more icing. I'm kind of glad I won't be at this party - there is kind of a lot of sugar going on in these cookies...
Cookielion on the prowl:
As an unlooked-for bonus, I realized after making the cutouts that the hippo head doubles nicely as a portly owl:
So it begins. As you know, I'm really only in my element in the autumn, paring knife in hand, carving up some pumpkins (or as Pookie adorably calls them, "pop-keys"). I decided to go with "Current events" for my first effort this season, so here is my Barack-o-lantern. Or just the Oblantern, if brevity is your thing.
It is Obama's profile, with the campaign logo cut (backwards) into the back of the pumpkin, so that the candle lights the front while throwing the logo-shaped shadow onto a wall. It was a reasonably successful effort, but I may try again in a few days and see if I can't get it perfect.
Note: Someone asked why I didn't use the smiling headshot as my inspiration, and it's because when you're doing a person on a pumpkin, teeth tend to look rather grotesque. Last year's King Leonidas from 300 was an exception. He was supposed to look intimidating.
I've submitted it over at www.yeswecarve.com, so we'll see what people think.
When oh when will I learn that my child does not like to take part in my costumed shenanigans? Never, most likely. And my photos will continue to come out like this.
To be fair, the ones in her Easter dress turned out much better than this. But the longer we went on, the tireder and hotter she got sitting under the lights, and the situation degenerated quickly. Even after a quick nap her mood wasn't as light as it should be when undertaking a shoot that includes props and costumes - I pushed it when I shouldn't have.
She went apeshit when I added the "chocolate candy smeared on face" element to jack up the cute factor. In hindsight, I should have known better.
But I'm sure I've learned nothing, and I will try this shoot again tomorrow. I sure didn't sew a pair of fur undies with a cotton tail on them for nothing!
ps- Remember when I said I'd try not to blog as much about my kid? Turns out my pants are, as they say, on fire.
Tyler Durden was right about that, because this vibrant scene of Ship Rock, shot Sunday afternoon, is no longer there. The rain and wind have sculpted a landscape of dreary, nearly-naked trees, with their remaining leaves decoupaged to wet trunks or blown into limp soggy piles.
When you're talking about "peak" color, it is a momentary burst. Autumn's beauty is the most fleeting and the most fragile, which is why (up here, anyway) it is the most beautiful of all the seasons.
I've always been drawn to outdoor works left by anonymous artists. Not the rednecky "I luv U Lurlene" sprayed-on-an-overpass variety, but the quirky "Artist with something for you to ponder and/or be amused about" variety that I see occasionally on buildings and in dark corners of alleys. This is one of the better examples I've seen lately. 
It looks like there is some Jamie Hewlett inspiration going on there along with a healthy dose of Jhonen Vasquez. Much more interesting than the usual crap people scrawl on the campus tunnel entrances.
Note: There are 2 longish tunnels on campus that are protected areas for painted/written expression. I've always loved the idea, but the reality is that there are a lot of badly-drawn greek letters and symbols with invites to frat keggers.
Last year there was an interesting altercation because a Christian group on campus painstakingly lettered an entire book of the bible in one of the tunnels, only to have it immediately defaced by the rugby team. Those Baptist kids were PISSED, lemme tell ya, and didn't quite consult their WWJD bracelets before retaliating in kind. Good times.
ps- I'm very please to be able to add back one of my favorite bloggers to the 'sphere. She went away for bit, but she's back and bettah than evah.
PUoTD: I got a nasty and alarming nosebleed the other night- the first one I've ever experienced.
Thanks, 50% extra blood volume!
The same night the kiddo was booting me pretty regularly, so after a particularly big kick I pushed back on the same spot, and she pushed back against my hand. Pretty neat feeling, although I'm sure it meant "Get the hell out of my house!" more than "Hi mom, let's bond."
My brother's show is over- it went splendidly. All involved are exhausted and happy.
I'm in Chattanooga now, some 5 hours later- art show one day, big game the next. Whew! I'll write more tomorrow.
Most of my spare time (haha, spare time. That's a good one!) lately has gone to helping Grf set up his warehouse gallery for his art exhibition, titled Hardships. My contributions pale in comparison to what L. and J. have done- this space has gone from being the warehouse time forgot to looking like a cutting-edge display space. It was no small feat, that's for sure. The show is next Thursday evening, so hopefully everything will be in place and ready to go by then.
I'll likely have to hop in the car and hotfoot it down to Chattanooga immediately afterwards for a big photo op, so that will be a packed 24 hours. To get there, the 'Neers have to win this weekend's game (on ESPN at 4:00 EST).
In addition to shooting the game (with Blue Ridge Blogger, of course!), I've been hired by ESPN to shoot some promo pics of one of the announcers for his upcoming autobiography. Should be pretty sweet (it's hard to tell with announcers, though. Some of them are real jerks.). It's a neat gig, at any rate, and since I'll already be there, who am I to turn down a book photo cred and some cash?
In a related story, a few posts down on BRB's site, she has an amusing photo of us on the sideline this past weekend, freezing our bootays off during one of the interminably long TV timeouts. And look- we're in HD!
And here's a "Congrats on the new job" to Vivi, a "happy belated birthday" to Ziggy, and a "will you please calm the hell down and enjoy this show because you're making everyone bonkers" to Grf. Hugs to you all.
Currently Listening to: The Sound of Silence, by Simon and Garfunkel
