Fun with Fabric

I didn't make much this year for my nephew's birthday or the holidays.  I mostly bought my way through, since I had so much going on with the show and those 21 crazy apples.  I did make one notable thing, though, for my nephew's birthday.

See, my 4-year-old nephew loves to cook.  It started with his play kitchen, and then he took a cooking class.  He loves it!  For Chanukah, in addition to a science kit because he also loves science, Eric and I actually got him two children's cookbooks.  These:

He loves them!  He's already made runaway pancakes and chocolate mousse, both from Fairy Tale Feasts.

So for his birthday, we kept with the theme.  In addition to getting him this set of 100 cookie cutters from Bed, Bath & Beyond, I made him this adorable apron.

The fabric is vintage (but brand new), from a New York fabric shop that no longer exists.  It belonged to my friend's grandmother decades ago, and my friend was generous enough to give me a ton of great vintage fabric from her mother's remaining stash.  This was part of that stash, and I think it's awesome.  I already had the denim for the pocket in my own collection, and only had to procure the bias tape.

I've used more of the fabric from my friend too.  A lot of what she gave me is decor fabric, and as it turns out, we needed some.  Our house was built in 1954 and is pretty drafty, especially by the front door and the door to the attic.  So Eric suggested door draft stoppers.  Well, why not?  I had this terrific funky fabric that looks to be circa 1960s or 1970s, and polyester fiberfill, and just needed the gravel to weigh it down!  So off we went to purchase gravel (and pick up a money tree, rubber tree, and flower pot while there - we're such impulse shoppers!) and some more fiberfill, and I got to work.

While making these door draft stoppers for our own house, I decided to make extras... and list them!  If you need any yourself, since they're a great way to save on energy costs, you can find them right here in Fabric of my Mind.

Christmas and New Year's at Our House

The food!  I haven't told you about the food.  Eric was in charge of Christmas dinner.  So...

Gotta have eggnog!  Man, I love eggnog.

Ravioli filled with black truffle & manchego, garnished with black truffle oil & herbs de Provence.  So good!

Lamb chops coated with foie gras and encrusted with crushed almond.

And for dessert, figs with grated manchego & powdered bacon.  I nearly exploded.

Then just a week later, New Year's Eve!  We hosted this year, a smallish party but a fun one.  In addition to stuffed mushrooms, mini hot dogs, and wings, Eric had fun with his dehydrator and made a dried fruit salad.  It had granny smiths, red delicious, pears, mango, kiwi, and banana.

And I did a parmesan pasta salad.

I also baked amaretto brownies and four different kinds of cookies - langues de chat, whiskey macks, gingerbread animals, and brandy snaps.

Want any of the dessert recipes?  Lemme know.  I wouldn't be able to promise recipes from Christmas, because Eric doesn't write anything down.

The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men...

(... often go astray.)

This turned out to be not bad, despite my frustration levels and snappishness.  And Eric was great about it.

See, we again held our annual Mardi Gras in June party, which I posted about last year.  It's always a big hit, and the guest list keeps getting bigger and better.  This year, in addition to my traditional southern pecan pies, I decided to try my first ever topsy turvy cake, since I'd taken that class.

I knew I'd need practice.  Thing is, covering a styrofoam practice round with fondant is a lot easier than actual cake.  And with a topsy turvy cake, the tiers are cut with the sides angled inward.  Not easy.  But I want to be able to do cool cakes for my nephew's birthday and other events.  So this was my first, and we'll sort of consider it practice.

It started off well.  I chose red velvet, since it's Eric's favorite.

I piled up the layers into the two tiers, and cut 'em to shape.

So far so good.  Then I filled and crumbcoated them with a cream cheese frosting recipe I got from this blog.

And therein lies the problem.  Not the frosting or the recipe, because holy crow was it good!  The problem is that it's a very wet type of frosting.  And fondant just loves to absorb moisture.  So... yeah.  There I am trying to cover the cake with fondant I colored and rolled out nice and thin, and it's getting all wet and sticky while I'm trying to get it to lie smooth and flat.

Frustration makes me snippy.

And Eric was really so awesome.  He kept getting things for me, and taking trash away, and asking what he could do to help.  And I was kinda snarly.

See, this was my plan.

Nice sharp edges, which if you look at the cut, shaped, but uncovered cake, were successful at the time.  Feathers, beads, a mask.  And those squiggles were to be fleur de lis.

Yeah.

In the end, I fought through, and came up with this...

Not as smooth as I wanted, obviously, and I got too tired to do beads for the top tier too.  The fleur de lis were a little misjudged.  And it got kind of ... bulbous rather than sharp.  Well, I tried.  And it's not bad, I suppose, for a first attempt.  I am, I have to say, really happy with my gum paste mask and feathers.  This was the first time I ever made or used gum paste.  And I'm happy with the Mardi Gras beads around the bottom.

Just... I need practice.  I know that.  And never again will I do cream cheese frosting with fondant.

It was a hit anyway, friends wouldn't let me cut it until they took a sufficient number of photos.  And of course they devoured it.  We were left with this.

Don't worry, we ate it.  But what of the leftover cake, the parts I had to cut off to shape it?  No worries, those became red velvet cake pops!

Yum!

Leave it to me to start with dessert first.  We did have crawfish too, I promise.  What's Mardi Gras without crawfish?

And etouffee, still my favorite food in the world.  It was such a hit last year that we ordered five pounds of tail meat this year instead of one.

Also devoured.

And drinks and platters, corn and potatoes.

In addition to the bubbles, balls, and sidewalk chalk we had for the kiddos...

... my friend Emilie pulled out her face painting kit.  There was one request for a tiger, though, so Emilie suggested I take that one.

He is my friend's son, and was hysterical.  He proceeded to run around the party roaring at everyone!

And to finish up, the photo I call "Aftermath of a Party."

Another success, in the end!

Cake Decorating: Class One, Day One

Many years ago, my mom and I took a cake decorating class at a local community school.  It was hosted by Wilton and focused on buttercream.  I was a mad decorator for a while, doing cakes every chance I got... my office got cakes, my family got cakes, even my mom's friend got a cake for her birthday.

It's been a while, though I could still probably dish out a competent rose or two.

But that's buttercream.  And while I love buttercream, there's no denying that fondant is just so appealing.

I actually own a package of Wilton fondant.  But I've been scared to even open it.  I watch those shows... Amazing Cakes, Cake Boss, Cake this, Cake that.  And I read cakewrecks.com every day (if you're on the ReefBotanicals twitter feed, you've gotten my messages about the really funny ones.

Well, mom called me a while back and told me that she saw two cake decorating classes at the Glen Rock Community School.  They run for three sessions each, technically*.  The Tuesday class is on "gift box cake decorating" and the Thursday class is on "topsy turvy cake decorating."  Yay!  Both fondant.  Yay!  So I signed up for both.  Yay!

Last night was the first night of the first class, wherein we started learning elements and techniques to make a cool gift box cake.  I'll start with the last first, since it's my favorite, this pretty bow.

Ooooooooooh.  Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah.

No, really, you should be oooh-ing and aaah-ing, because, Dude, I made that.  With my own two little hands.  Kickin', right?

And there was this cute "whimsical flower."

My slightly heavy handed attempt at a peony.  Now I know not to squish so hard, I'll get it better next time.

And how cute is this little orange?  Yes, I know it's pink, but that's the color fondant with which I was working.  And "pinkange" just doesn't work.

Know what the stem is?  Clove!  How nifty is that?

And last but not least, this awesome technique with stencils and edible color powder...

I also learned something called "flooding," but didn't get good shots of it, so you don't get to see.  Now I just can't wait for Thursday's class, where it's not just fondant but also how to structure the uneven tiers.  Woohoo!

*Turns out our teacher will be competing on the Food Network and has to fly out to Colorado for the middle Tuesday class, so she just extended the first and third classes from two hours to three.

How We Celebrated

First, there was Chanukah.

We all met at my sister and brother-in-law's house for mom's brisket sandwiches (yum!) and latkes (yum!), and to exchange gifts.  My nephew became totally enamored with the dreidel, which my brother-in-law spun for him.  I can tell this kid is going to love tops.

I'll have to get him one ASAP, if I can find one for under-three kiddos.

At Chanukah, we gave my nephew his mooshy belly bunny and bear, as well as a See 'n' Say (remember those?) and a CD version of "Free to Be You and Me."  We gave my sister this travel tea infuser from Libre Tea.

And of course we gave her some loose tea to go with it.  She's been taking it to work every day, where people have liked it so much they've bought some too!  To be honest, I really wanted one also, and was deciding whether I should just get one.  Turns out I didn't have to.  I'll get to that.  This is gonna be a long post, so find a comfy seat.

My sis and brother-in-law got us a gift certificate to their favorite restaurant, which was funny because then our parents surprised them with one too, so now we can go together on a double date!  And they got me a beautiful paperweight, since I collect art glass.

Our parents gave us great stuff - the serving dishes and cereal bowls to our china set,  plus a remote starter and a gorgeous new Coach bag for me!

Then came Christmas.

On December 24, Eric had off from his day job, and I worked 1/2 a day.

Before we left, the office staff gathered us together to give us gifts, which I thought was really sweet.  I got this great set of pancake & biscuit mixes, preserves, and syrup.

Then we got together in Manhattan with a friend Eric hadn't seen since high school and her husband, who were down from Canada.  From there, we drove them back to her parents' house in Queens, and then went to deliver the Christmas present for our nephew on Eric's side, who lives in that boro.  The baby and his parents weren't home, so we dropped off the gift, and then headed to Eric's brother's job to surprise him.  It worked, too, he was shocked!  From there, we picked up some more of Eric's friends, and hung out for a bit.

It was really a great Christmas Eve, seeing a bunch of people we otherwise wouldn't have been able to see.

Then we came home, in a great mood, and hid from each other to wrap gifts and stuff stockings... and by then it was nearly 1 a.m.  Impatient Eric asked to exchange gifts since it was technically Christmas, and I relented.  He's so like a kid!

The biggest gift I got him was a 14.5 gallon stainless steel conical fermenter for brewing beer.  This is serious stuff!

Should I be concerned that he keeps giggling over it?  I also got him an organic cotton t-shirt that says on it "Save the Ales:  Support Your Local Brewery," which he loves.

In his stocking, in addition to every bag of Reese's candies I could find (his favorite), I put some funny books and a cute little game.  That bottom book is The Zen of Zombies.  Who doesn't love zombies?

For me, he outdid himself!  He got me a SodaStream, which I really wanted, but never mentioned to him.  And he was afraid I'd think it was stupid!  I love it!  I'm a big seltzer drinker, which normally unfortunately can mean lots of plastic bottles.  This is such a green substitute!  Plus, I can order all-natural & unsweetened flavors to add... for healthy and yummy seltzer all the time!  

It was apparently a really hot item, too.  He had to run to a lot of stores to find it, and they were all sold out.

As "stocking stuffers," he got me new Bare Minerals lip glosses.  I'm addicted to Bare Minerals, so that was perfect.

And they're in great colors for me!  He also got me - and this is why I don't need to get myself a Libre Tea  - a travel tea infuser from Teavana!  I swear, sometimes we share a brain, because I hadn't really mentioned that I wanted one of these either.  Instead of the clear glass, he picked a ceramic one for me, because it was blue, my favorite color.

But wait, there's more!  He also got me, allegedly as a stocking stuffer, only it wouldn't fit in my stocking, a kit and instructional book on how to do aromatherapy and hot stone massage!  

Of course, it's  more important that he read it and learn to do it on me than I read it to do on him.  Right?

Best gifts ever.

On Christmas Day, we spent a rather uneventful but satisfying day completely cleaning our house.  We put away stuff that hadn't been put away since we moved here in September, and cleaned to a state of "sterile" this house has never seen, probably not even when the owner was living here.  It feels great!  It was necessary because of our Sunday guests, one of whom was to be our one-year-old nephew.

And then came the blizzard.

Yeah, that's our wrought iron deck table and the umbrella that had been closed until the wind blew it open.  I righted the table and put the umbrella in the garage, but one by one, our friends and family dropped out of coming to dinner on Sunday, leaving just one couple to brave the snow.  And they did!

A good thing, too, since our 20 lb turkey was already defrosted and marinated.

And I had the green beans and honeyed carrots ready to go (which I served in our new serving dishes from my parents).

And of course we did roasted potatoes.

But first there was salad, served with a dressing Eric made and some amazing homemade croutons from my boss' wife.

All of this, though, was built around the main course, that turkey, which my kamikaze husband and his insane friend deep fried in the driveway on a rig Eric built!

In the blizzard.

Seriously.

When the turkey was finally ready to come in, Gina had to catch the oil on a pan.

While I got the stuffing balls ready for deep-frying.

The turkey looked almost as great as it tasted!  Eric and I both took turns carving it, with some help.

After all that, we were seriously stuffed.  But did you think we'd skip dessert?  Silly, silly people.  Of course there was dessert!  Who do you think I am?

I baked nut fingers!

Oh, and if you ever want to have some great guests?  Invite Rand & Gina.  In addition to a huge umbrella for each of us, they brought Eric a set of Mikasa Brewmaster glasses and me a great tealight holder.

The blizzard turned them into overnight guests, too.  I'm glad we have a guest room!

The next day, we had to deal with the snow.  Eric had already taken the day off from work, but then the governor declared a state of emergency, so my office was closed too.  I shoveled this mess, with some help from Eric.

Meg was happy, though.

Now Eric just has to break out that massage kit, since my muscles are all sore...