Birthdays

Today my daughter turned 9. so for the next month I have a 12 yr old, tow 9 yr olds and two 7 yr olds, none of them twins. My daughter and step son are exactly 11 months apart to the day, so for 1 month a year they are the same age. And my son and step daughter are just under 5 months apart, so they are the same age for 7 months a year.

I always make a special cake for the kids birthdays, and for todays I did a cute gummy bears at the beach scene/theme.

I cut out a section of the top cake layer and filled it with a mix of blue and green jello, and added gummy sharks. The floaty tubes are gummy peach rings and of course gummy bears. I used marzipan for the beach blankets, ball, sand pails and scoops. The sun shade is a small truffle paper on a toothpick with gummy pieces securing the cup. I used a tooth pick broken off to make the footprints in the sand. It was pretty fun to make, and the kids liked it too, jello AND cake!!

Tomorrow I take my first official polymer clay bead making class. Which is being  taught by my RL friend Elaine of   http://www.tooaquarius.com/ She has wanted to teach me for a few years, so this should be fun. Later in the week my 2 eldest daughters are taking classes from her as well on making critters. I may post about it tomorrow, IF I remember my camera. I am awful for forgetting it and wishing I had it.  I'll try to remember to put it in my back pack for tomorrow.
C'ya!

Family stuff

I have been rather busy with the family lately. My middle daughter Kaylens birthday is in Aug, so if she wants any friends to come to the party we have it in June. I always make the kids special home made cakes, and she wanted a flower garden with her name in roses and gummy worms all over. I have very little skill with icing technique. So I used skills learned from polymer clay sculpting that my friend Elaine of Tooaquarius taught me and used marzipan to which rose extract and red food colour was added. The girls liked it.

The same weekend there was a big annual Picnic in the Park, a family fun day, with games, food and live entertainment. My eldest daughter was a volunteer face painter and got to paint her littlest brothers face.

And the museum put on a mock trial and used volunteers from the audience.... yeah they picked me. I was told to improv my lines if I wanted, so I hammed it a bit. It was fun, and a nice end to the day.

Alyia, our youngest daughter had her friend birthday party this past weekend, she asked for a unicorn cake, which is much easier than the rose garden was!

And I leave you with the PS2 family airband, Kaylen is in the back on drums, Alyia is our lead singer, Braydon and Geran are our guitarists, Adaira isn't in the photo, I guess she must be the manager, LOL!! Note the rockin' PJs onstage!

The Weeknd of Company

Phew!! What a busy couple of days!!

My good friend and fellow etsy artist Elaine (tooaquarius.etsy.com) and her daughter were down for a visit. As it was her B-day and her daughter is a good friend of my eldest daughtetrs we had Chloe over for a 2 night sleepover Fri and Sat. At the same time my in-laws were down to visit and they haven't seen the kids since before Christmas!!

So Sat afternoon (Valentines) we took all 6 kids to the hotel where the in-laws were staying and went swimming, and then we went out for burgers. That evening the kids played and the adults played a board game and chatted.

Sun we took the kids and In-laws to church, and then out for a brunch smorg, and good thing because I don't think I have ever seen the kids so hungry!! The 5 yr old ate way more than I did!! That evening we had a pork roast supper, and then I brought out the birthday cake, a white chocolate cheesecake with whipped cream and strawberries. Elaine must have liked it because I got several thank-you s and tiny little thing that she is had 2 helpings ( gotta tease ya, sorry) That night Adaira slept over with Chloe at E's hunnys house , who happens to be my hubbies best friend (cool no?) Today (mon) is Family day, Adaira was dropped off at 1:00 ish and Elaine and Chloe headed for home. I am a bit tired and wish we could have visited (crafted with) with Elaine more, but oh well maybe next time won't be so busy.

Happy Birthday!!

Baking with kids

MMMM cake!!

This week I have a few baking projects to do. I have a cake for a church function happening today, cupcakes for my sons kindergarten class Valentines party, and a B-day cake for my friend and fellow etsy artist Elaine aka Tooaquarius.

Last night I started making the cake for the church, angelfood cake hollowed out and filled with chocolate mousse. My daughter age 7 wanted to help sooo badly. I made the cake and she made the mousse, measuring out and adding all the ingrediants, and using my hand mixer like a pro. Actually her mousse was as good or better than mine! And the best part for herwas licking the beaters off! For me the best part was cooking with my daughter, like my mom used to bake with me. Oh the memories, and lessons learned, baking is a fun way to begin teaching the kids to cook, and they are so proud of themselves! At moms hip was where I began my passion for cooking, and I think my middle child here has it too. One of my goals as a mom is to ensure all 5 of them can cook. At least enough to feed themselves before they leave home. Mac n cheese are all well and good on occasion but I don't want them to have to live off of it. Here is the final result--> She did a great job!

Tonight I make the cupcakes and I will be getting my boy to help me with them as well, at 4 he could flip pancakes, so mixing up cupcakes should be no problem! Now, who to help with Elaines cheesecake...

Birthday Party

I'm ba-ack!

This weekend was BUSY!! I had parent teacher interview with my eldests teachers, and it wasn't good. She's very behind in her math, and her math binder is so disorganized that she's done 2 of the assignments twice. So we got the binder organized, and got her down to business and all caught up, phew!! The interviews with my step kids were much better, both are doing well, and Alyia is adjusting to kindergarten very well, even if she can't remember most of the kids names LOL!

Sat Adaira had her 11th B-day party which was a sleep-over, or rather a no sleep over. The girls were up allnight chatting and giggling as only a gaggle of pre-teen girls can. I always make a fun cake for the kids and this year I did a switch a roo for the 11th, the main course wasa 2 layer meatloaf which i frosted with mashed potatoes and filled with cheese. I even wrote happy birthday on top in ketchup and told the girls that we were having cake first since 11 is the same forwards and back. They were pretty impressed with this turn of events and then were amused when it ended up being meatloaf. The dessert I made was a 3 layer cke made to look like a hamburger, the middle layer was left un frosted as the patty and the filling was coloured icing as the cheese, relish and mayo and strawberry jam as ketchup, I used almond slices as the sesanme seeds on the top "bun" too.

Last night we did a bit of shopping and then i decided to try playing with polymer clay again. I made a couple warped faces and an eye cane that I rolled a bit wrong and the iris is not really round. I dunno how long it took Elaine to figure this all out, but I know it won't come quickly either.

I'll get better with more practice, and now that i am done with craft show season I might concentrate more this winter on learning the how to's.