From Fondant to Fangs

My oldest Angel has taken to baking interesting and intricate cakes which require working with something called fondant. Fondant. Just the word sounds messy and complicated!
So when she showed up on Halloween morning with her boyfriend, The Cheesemiester(a nickname gained after a Pizza-Hut commercial that he starred in) and her best friend from middle school, to create a masterpiece, I knew it would be amusing. They baked a blood-red cake. They created the fondant and used black food coloring to achieve the dark, black as night color. They pounded and kneaded for thirty to forty minutes each, coating their hands in Crisco so that the black food coloring would not stain their skin. The Cheesemiester definitely enjoyed this activity the most!(Boys!) And when everything was finished, they carefully rolled out the fondant(Can you tell I like using that word?) into a thin layer. They then placed it gingerly over the top of the cake and cut around the edges so that it would fit perfectly. The entire project took several hours...

which is probably why there were exuberant high-fives going on when the cake was finally completed!(That and the exorbitant amount of powdered sugar, marshmallow and frosting they ingested.)

Lots of pictures were taken.

Muscles were displayed with pride.
Until AD1 sensed what was going on behind her head,
and she turned around to take a bite out of her boyfriend's finger!
The finished product was a cake for a birthday/Halloween party with a Vampire theme. HBO has been running a series called True Blood for the past year and a half which features, you guessed it, Vampires.(and Werewolves!) I watched it first season, but have yet to catch up on the second one. It is pretty scary!
My oldest Angel Daughter who has the most vivid imagination, LOVES SCARY! My sweet, never hurt a fly, spiritual, beautiful Angel Daughter LOVES SCARY!!!
Which is why she transformed herself from this...
INTO THIS...(Sorry, Micah!)
for Halloween!(No animals were actually harmed during the photographing of this Vampire!)
Mark is so proud of his little Vampire!(No Daddies were harmed, either.)
And since AD1 would never consider harming another living thing, she brought her own supply of Tru Blood to the party. Tru Blood is a synthetically prepared drink created specifically for Vampires who choose to live(or un-live), as vegetarians.(It's actually orange soda, but don't tell anyone.)
From fondant to fangs. Sometimes we need to challenge ourselves by taking the things that scare us the most and facing them head on!

Happy November, dear hearts!

The Queen of Hearts

My littlest angel dressed up as The Queen of Hearts for Halloween. After she did her make-up and fussed with her hair for about an hour, she reminded me that we still had to carve our pumpkins. She and I stood in the kitchen laughing, and carving, while we chatted about life. When my littlest angel drew the face on her pumpkin and began cutting, she decided that it was not turning out exactly the way that she wanted it to. I told her that sometimes, even when we plan things, the results might just turn out differently than what we had anticipated. Sometimes, we have our hearts so set on the "planning", that we then forget how to enjoy the ultimate outcome. We talked about finding joy both in the process and the final product. We discussed "letting go" , while being creative, because sometimes things turn out even better than what we originally had in mind.

When I stepped outside, this morning, I noticed that our little pumpkin had rotted into itself. It reminded me that another Halloween had come and gone. It reminded me that no matter how hard we try to control the outcome of things, we just can't. And so, I pulled out this picture of The Queen of Hearts and her pumpkin. It made me smile because I still had the memories of that day, and although the pumpkin may not have turned out exactly the way she had planned it would, it was perfect. Exactly what this pumpkin looked like is not something that will forever stick within our minds, but the joyful, relaxed time that we had while creating it, now that is something that will always remain. Once again The Queen of Hearts, stole my heart.

May you always remember to take pleasure in the journey, and never forget that it is not always the outcome that matters, but the moments that you enjoyed, while on your way.