Nag, Nag, Nag

My friends are tyrants.

I have been reprimanded by two individuals formerly considered my friends. Not that I am naming names, but one of them is a bit reptilian, and the other translates Latin. Apparently, I haven't been posting to my blog with sufficient frequency.

So, I thought I would post a quick recap of my last few days, so you can see where I have been, and cordially remove yourselves from my back.

Friday, April 6th - Braves Home Opener
We went to the Braves game after work on Friday. Technically, we went to a bar, then the Braves game, then a bar again, but who wants to get technical?

Sure that sounds like fun, and very relaxing, if you don't factor in the facts that the Braves lost by a lot (something like 11-0) and we were outside, and the temperature was down in the mid-40s. As in 45 degrees. COLD. Plus, there was some sort of Arctic wind, keeping the flags and pennants standing straight out. I managed to stick it out until the 8th inning, then went back inside.

Saturday, April 7th
I did almost nothing. It was AWESOME! I slept in, walked the dog and vegged out all day.

Sunday, April 8th
I realized that I had a lot to do, and since I had done almost nothing on Saturday, Sunday was a busy day.

I baked the two layers for the cake that I would need to assemble for my cake decorating class on Tuesday. I wrapped them in plastic wrap, and stowed them in the fridge.

I sifted two pounds of powdered sugar, and made a HUGE bowl of buttercream icing. Just smelling it now, makes me feel vaguely sick. I have been smelling sugar for over a week now.

I also did a lot of laundry, but that is even less interesting than the sifting story.

Monday, April 9th
I whomped up a mixture of half buttercream icing and half Smuckers raspberry fruit spread. So yummy.

After that, I outlined one layer, with a barrier of buttercream icing, then filled in the resulting pool with the raspberry cream, and slapped the other layer on top.

I crumb coated the cake, which is a very thin layer of frosting, that helps keep air out of the cake, and seals all the crumbs in, so the next layer of frosting won't show any crumbs or bleed through from fillings.

Tuesday, April 10th
I packed a bag and dragged my cake, and all cake-related paraphernalia to the office (22 miles), then to the class (13 miles), then home again (9 miles). By the time I take it back to the office tomorrow (another 22 miles), the damn thing will have over 65 miles on it...

In class today, we covered a lot of information, since it is just me in class. We covered writing, dots, stars, and lines. We also skipped ahead and did the rose. More on that in a minute.

Since we are able to move quickly, we aren't going to have the final class, so next week will be my last class of this series. Next week, we are covering things like shell borders, sweet peas, drop flowers and piping figures. I can take the next class, Class 2, which will teach me how to do several more flower types, including violets, pansies, daisies and several more.

- - -

I feel like I have been sticky for DAYS. Every time I have to touch icing, it means that bags, couplers, tips and spatulas are dirtied and have to be cleaned. I am not even really looking forward to eating the damn thing tomorrow. Hopefully, familiarity really will breed contempt.

Any hoo, if you made it through all of this whining, here are a few pictures of my cake, in various states of completion.


Here they are, in their little plastic wrap jackets.

Instead of a plastic wrap jacket, here is the cake in its crumb coat.






Explaining why this cake says, "3 days old" is a whole different post. I will try to do it tomorrow.







Here is a rose that I did today. I think it was my fourth attempt.

The earlier ones really did look like a wad of toilet paper. This one does bear a slight resemblence to a flower.