Army of Cuteness

Back from vacation - it was fun, I missed the kiddo, I'm glad we're home (but not looking particularly forward to another football season yet). I'd post all about it, but really it was 5 days sitting on my butt in or around the Caribbean while sipping mojitos, snorkeling, and reading the fifth Outlander book. Not much else to say.

But we're back to reality now, trying to navigate the choppy waters of parenthood, ASU students returning to school and gridlocking the whole western part of the state, me attempting to finally finish my damn graduate degree, and us all bracing for the inevitable impact of Football Season. (I'm sure that will be addressed in another post.)

But tonight. Ah, tonight.
My friend invited us to her daughter's 2nd birthday party on Friday. I offered to bring something and she waved me off, "No, no, just come. It's a ladybug theme, I'll get the bakery to do something." When I asked again she said if I really wanted to do something I could make cookies. So yeah, cookies. No problem-o. Who doesn't love sugar cookies? They're quick and easy!

So tonight during post-dinner playtime we were sculpting in play-doh, and I thought,"I could make ladybugs out of this for Magster's party, but they'd taste narsty." But THEN I remembered that I had some leftover fondant from Octocake. I got it out and worked in some food dye, and Pookie and I sat at the table, fashioning little red balls, approximately 2x the size of real ladybugs. Fun, fun.

 After she went to bed, though, things got a bit Out of Hand. I made them little heads. Then I used chocolate sprinkles for antennae and poked those into the heads, then used my trusty exacto knife to carve the wings out a bit, and then painted them with black food dye.

By the time the double batch of sugar cookies (cut into flowers, hearts, and the letters in the birthday girl's name) were out of the oven I had an army, a swarm, a plague of these little edible red and black bugs. They go forth and cause people to have diabetes at my bidding, so beware.

Also, I'm fairly sure my friend is going to think me daft. I don't think we've been friends long enough for her to know that to me "ridiculously time-consuming and intricate bug-making in gum paste" translates to "fairly normal wednesday evening" to me.
Most importantly, of course, I want Maggie to love them. (She is the sweetest, most adorable child - she looks like a little wood sprite, a dryad perhaps. I'll have to ask her mom's permission to post her photo so you can see how beautiful she is) And apparently she has a great love for bugs and worms and creepy-crawlies. I hope mine pass muster!

Comments

[Forrest]

Ya know, these are GREAT depth of field examples for your department intern. Just sayin...

[old gray mare]

omg,you've done it again! I love your imagination, Leila. You provide the detail that makes life beautiful.

[gnumoon]

Forrest -
Photography-wise, they are awful. It was 2am, and apparently my MBP monitor isn't calibrated at all. I may have to go in and fix those, because the yellow cast is bothering me. And for the depth of field, well, I didn't have good lighting in the kitchen, so I had to be at f/2.8

Ba -
Yu can imagine Pooks' reaction this morning ... "So yittle! So cute! I can pet them??"

[kathy]

OK, I'm inviting you over for next weekend. Can you whip up something Alabama football related for the big game? :)