Le ramblings of such and suches

Yeah, I know.. It's been sometime since I've last blogged! Life has been somewhat busy I suppose, well I have this crazy family (Correction, crazy MOMMY.) who enjoys planning for way too many field trips and outside-the-house-days and it kinda drains your energy and at the same time makes you value your at-home-time a whole lot more and since the boys and crazy Mommy are at the pool, I shall use this "Apartment alone" (Yes, we have been staying in an apartment for about.. 4ish or so days now, I can't remember cause time seems to be rather draggy here in this very small space! Ah well, at least I can get online!) time to blog.


Oh right, before I forget I might as well tell you what we are doing living in this tiny apartment that's located somewhere in Damansara..
I signed up for the 3 month City and Guilds patisserie diploma and the start of that three month course/diploma/thang starts on March 1st (Just a day before my fourteenth birthday!) and have I told you how much I love attending courses/diplomas/thangs?!
I mean.. It's always nice being surrounded by people who share your passion and being the youngest in class!
And by being the youngest you are usually-ish in the spot light and who doesn't enjoy getting attention, eh?
Oh yarh, that's basically why we moved down to this tiny apartment and I can hardly wait for March 1st to come! Even though I'm a teeny bit nervous on starting this super long course..
I think I read something about a uniform being included.. I hope a toque (I learnt what that white fluffy hat was called from Ratatouille! That show is AMAZING! My favorite line is probably Anton Ego's "Not everyone can become a great artist, but a great artist can come from ANYWHERE.")  is included cause I've ALWAYS wanted to wear on and one of those white chef-y uniforms with them big, black and bold buttons and whipping up patisseries everyday for 3 whole months!


ANYWHOO.. Let's start this post of with some cakes!

I am pretty proud of this cake, well not exactly the cake since it's just a regular butter cake (The birthday boy's favorite!) that's wrapped in a layer of butter cream and grey fondant.. So let me rephrase that, I am pretty proud of the CAKE TOPPER/figurine/sugar thang since this is my very first mythical creature and it turned out WAAAAAAAAAY better than I expected it to look!

Oh righty and it's my first time using a 'Wire armature" (A metal skeleton in other words.) for my sugar figurines and definitely sticking to them! How on earth could I not have thought about using them before?! I mean they are SO easy to make and they support the figurine SO well! Mr Infernal (Apparently my brother is quite alright at naming stuff to and I wonder how on earth he knew what an "Infernal" is.. Eh, strange person.) is still sitting in my cakery with all limbs and stuff intact, well the ants are slowly eating it's toes up but it is overall still in good condition! Usually gum paste stuff in my cakery that's left without a dehumidifier (A dehumidifier is a caker-who-lives-in-a-very-humid-part-of-the-world's bestfriend!) would turn into a pile of sludge overnight, it's a wonder how he is still standing on his own four feet.. Maybe I have to thank luster dust a bit too, hmm..       

Oh, speaking of luster dust.. I CAN'T BELIEVE I FINALLY USE THEM AFTER LIKE.. 3 YEARS! 

Long story short-

One day after reading some Alan Dunn book, 11 year old KCC decided to go get some PETAL dust to dust her rather ugly so-called "Gumpaste flowers" and she went to the only cake decorating supply shop she knew and it was called "Cake Connection" ANNND too bad cause they only had LUSTER dust left AAANNNDD she bought the luster dust dust cause she thought it would work only too bad cause the LUSTER dust was quite glittery and she ended up with glittery leafs and flowers.. THE END.

So yeah, I had absolutely NO use for them.. Until NOW! *Insert evil maniac laughter here* 

But before I splashed the "Holly green" luster dust on something told me to use a "Base color" and that base color (Speaking of color.. I asked the birthday boy what color he wanted his dragon to be and he said "Blue and red".. Or something like that, I only recall it as a horrid color combination! So since he has a horrible taste of colors I decided to make it MY favorite color, turquoise! I think I am a horrible sister.) was SK's "Hydrangea", one of my favorite dusting colors next to this deep, dark purple color which sounds a bit like "Aborigine"only it isn't and I can't believe I actually forgot what it is called! And a light pink called Tangerine, only I think CK labeled that dust wrong cause aren't tangerines orange? 

The most tiresome part of this particular figurine (My inspiration for Mr Infernal was from EVERYWHERE! I literally pieced together all my favorite parts of dragons I found on the web into one and he turn out looking quite handsome! Not Frankenstein-ish in anyway!) was probably the skin.. Each scale on that monster's body is HAND-POKED! ..With a Wilton 1L piping tip cause I was WAAY too lazy to actually cut out scales! Thank goodness I didn't do that or the cake would NEVER be done on time! 

The reason why Mr Infernal (I think I have got to stop calling it that..) has "Battle wounds" are because the birthday boy wanted him to be like you know those, errh.. Victorious hero from battle thingmajig, umm.. I think I'm ain't a very good explainer but basically Mr-Ahh I mean INFERNAL just won the battle!

One of the things I was MOST worried (Actually I was kinda worried about EVERYTHING since I have never made a dragon head to well, any part of a dragon before!) about was probably the claws and the muscles (I know them muscles are pretty minimal! I'll try to make my next dragon buffer! Hahaha!), only somehow they turned out the easiest to be made and I REALLY enjoyed making the feet! I make TERRIBLE human hands and feet but good dragon ones.. I think it's because the human hand and feet making was TAUGHT to me, I usually do better when I invent the whole thing and not to mention it's funner and free!

Zed Dabaliewee (She's one of my best pals!) came over to our Port Dickson place for the very first time on Fai's birthday and we made this poster together on the day after the party and now it's up on my cakery's wall! 

Okay, MOVING ON!

Equally as proud of my garbage truck! It's my very first pair of gumpaste "Wheels"!

It was rather exciting, getting an order for a gumpaste garbage truck topper (Unfortunately it wasn't a cake!)! Well, aren't all "Firsts" exciting?!

Never made SO many templates for a project before and never appreciated my craft knife this much too!

Again, it was interesting.. Exploring new techniques!

Since it was a garbage truck I decided to go ahead and paint garbage juice all over it and it made Mommy and Papa scream but I think a garbage truck with sludge all over lets the truck have a little more "Character" and after all, it's a garbage (Speaking about garbage.. I think I need to make better garbage bags next time round! These look a little like wontons.. Omnomnom!) truck and I doubt you have seen a squeaky clean one!

Making the maggots (Yes, that's what those mysterious white spots that are on the garbage are!) were fun since I had actual maggots to look at!

The day before making the maggots, Papa and I were plucking some weird fruit thing from our garden because he wanted to try to make wine out of them and MOST of them were crawling with maggots! I think these turn into fruit flies..

And I kept them in a container like I usually do when I find snails/slugs/maggots/other creepy crawlies in the fruits and vegetables! Oh lookie here! I actually found an old post of my no-need-to-look-after-muchie-pets: My arys

So.. Sometime a month back or so, I suddenly fell in love with YouTube again! And this time.. With fashion and beauty videos! Yeah, that's my current secret, I mean not-so-secret-anymore obsession (Speaking about obsessions.. I am officially a scarf freak! No thanks to those "Forgot-how-many ways to wear a scarf video"!) !

I don' know why but I think playing with fashion is fun and I DO feel like I want to go into the fashion industry, it sounds fun!

And along the way I also found some jewelry making and re-vamping/re-using old stuff videos, I guess you could say I was pretty inspired by them and decided to try some stuff out by turning that old t-shirt to an off shoulder half top AND making bows..

Only I don't recall watching a bow making video but one day I just sat down making cloth bows and soon moved to ribbon pinwheel bows! 

As the days passed all my plain hair clips and hairbands has bows stuck on them and soon ran out of stuff to stick them on!

So one evening while we were out we went to a "Pasar Malam" and I stumbled across half a dozen hair starf-y shops and went on a buying frenzy! Who knew it was so fun buying plain hair accessories?! 

Making your own accessories is a pretty fun way to pass time I suppose! And not to mention you can wear what you made out!

Above: My re-vamped ballet flats!

Below: More bows accessories! The white cloth is from a long pant lining!

Above: Made this today after watching a "How to make a bohemian wrap bracelet" (I LOVE bohemian stuff! I mean, I have ALWAYS loved them since they are so "Island/vacation-ish"!) about a week back, only I made it without that troublesome threading!

-Karen Cuppy Cake

ICCA Annual Wedding Cake Competition 2011/Ebony

Before I say anything more may I laugh my head off at that "Hot Dogs" sign in the back ground? Hahahhaha!

Wonderful, have I kept you waiting for long? Well I hope I did cause the longer you wait the more you want to read it or maybe.. You would have totally forgotten about it...

Didn't exactly feel like posting much because there were so many pictures to upload and the size or something of the pictures I take with my "new" camera is apparently HUGE so it takes YEARS (As in one picture takes 10 minutes, so by the time everything finishes loading someone would be bugging to use the laptop or I placed the pictures in the wrong order again... Or.. Something like that! Innocent-please-don't-kill-me grin*)

So ANYWAYS, without further adoo (Hmm... Is "Adoo" even a word? I think it's "a due" after all.. Funny how I hear that all the time in "Speeches" and I don't know what's the word they are using..) and if you haven't met/seen her already, Ebony.

If you were wondering how I got her name well.. It was a pretty hard, brian brain cracking task but somehow or brother rather this line from Snow white popped out in my head "Her face as white as snow and her hair as black as Ebony", or... Something like that, can't exactly remember but YAY, I got another one of those things-that-are-black names, I use so many of those names (I think I should make an "Anti black piping or fondant" cake soon or my heads gonna explode..) for my cakes that I can't think of anymore! 

I don't know, there isn't much to write about this year on the competition (I knooow, I didn't write about the competition at ALL last year but trust me I was SO happy I was in tears but this year I was SO UNhappy I was in tears, sometimes I wonder why I cry all the time, yeesh, I'm utterly disappointed in myself.) and I don't exactly feel (As in I REALLY want to but well.. That person would probably not stumble across my blog or anything but err... I am horrible at making up excuses, aren't I?) like bashing people because, ONE it wouldn't make any difference since the whole event is already over, all I can do is just praaaaay that IT won't happen again next year or.. Or.. There WILL be WAR, and I don't want a few "certain people" to think I'm a "monster"... Of some sort. 

ANYWAYS (I can complain ALL day but I have.to.control.control.restrict.control.my.temper. Don't lose my temper so-sso quickly, bobeepbobeepbobeepbobeepbobeep AH! Bobeep- Oops, got carried away...) let me tell you the FULL (Did a pretty brief one when I posted her on my FaceBook wall.) story behind Lady Ebony.. From top to toe! That.. Strangely sounds like those "Top to toe" body wash stuff.. Hah, stinky random things that pop into my mind..

1.

The main "Rosey ruby" bouquet, have been doing pink roses too much, needed a change (And I wanted the flowers to "POP" from the monochrome-ish cake and pink doesn't really "POP" all that much!) so the roses went RED and boy, I am officially sick of red roses and the HUMONGOUS pile of petal dust that is needed for a SINGLE rose, it's seriously CRAZY! 

I had never made an actual bouquet before, you know.. Those that have OTHER things besides the flower and their "Proper" leaf so I relied on Alan Dunn a lot for well... Inspiration on how to put the whole bouquet together?

The bouquet is made out of life size red roses, I-forgot-the-name berries (This was pretty much everyone that saw my bouquet's favorite touch, I think it's mine too! But I somehow like the poppy seed heads just as much since I made them by myself AKA without Alan's books! Try spotting them!), ornamental grass, simple rose leafs or any random green leaf, poppy seed heads, random long leaf/grass thingy AKA my "Trafulla tree" (Oh dear.. I haven't watered it in AGES! Is it still alive?! Press panic button*), I-forgot-the-name seed pods. 

I REALLY dislike my flower arranging, should have done more research.. Frowny face*   

2.

Apologizes for "Monochroming" it, it just looks SO beautiful like this! Well... To me, apparently not everyone enjoys monochrome stuff like I do.

I absolutely LOVE this tier, actually all my "lace" tiers, apparently it's my "strong point" and I find it very unique because well, I invented it? 

I started doing this when I realized how beautiful those damask stencils looked and.. How expensive they were, I couldn't afford to buy them so I decided to kinda.. Pipe them?

But as USUAL, I am a horrible copycat so somehow or rather, I discovered this "lace" technique and I am pretty pleased with this first attempt (That took like 1 lazy week to complete!) and look forward to seeing some lace on my next few cakes!

Oh yes, forgot to mention that I used the so called "Eye lid technique", you know.. Poke random holes in fondant while it is still dry and pipe around it, the holes were the centers of my fantasy lacy flowers and meet my old friend, "Fish net extension work"! 

I know, it's pretty short! Had to do it on the spot, had NO idea I could travel with it but apparently Alan says it's possible (Pipe, dry, travel with it upside down.. How risky is THAT?! Oh well, there's always the "Pipe on the spot" option if it doesn't work out!)! Well, there's always next time!

OHOH, another thing! I wonder if anyone noticed the random "collar" of piped flowers on top of the lace work, I was too lazy to pipe a "proper" collar and some how the royal icing run out I was working with would somehow soften (Ahem, short story: I wanted to do a RI lace fan at the base of the cake board, gave up after making the fan for the 2 1/2 time, it was SUPER time consuming and it always, sob, melted. Sigh, the cake would have look beautiful with it.. I guess Ebony REALLY didn't like fans, sheesh, what a fussy lady.) overnight, even with a dehumidifier...

Oh yes also take note that all of the piping for this cake was done FREEHAND.. Simply because I'm too lazy to stencil stuff out and go over it AGAIN with the icing, such a timesa wasting thing to do! 

Well, I'm glad I'm gifted with being able to just "Eye ball" things.. 

3.

(I just realized you could see a couple of "fishnet drop strings" that didn't make it!)

Second try at "lacing things up", my ABSOLUTE favoritest tier/cake board (But leaning to the cake board side, wait. I think this whole thing is "One piece" so, never mind!), EVER.

The "cake" (Everything is styrofoam.) was made up of freehand over piped fantasy flowers and leafs but somehow my favorite part of that "tier" is the lace boarder on top of all the flowers.

The lace boarder was pretty much inspired by Raven Madison, a fictional character from one of my favorite books, Vampire Kisses with fictional clothes, so I'd just have to imagine how her lovely lacy gothic (I simply LOVE gothic stuff, mainly because well... It's different and all that LACE! I would like to own a wardrobe full of gothic dresses and the other one full of my usual... Colorful clothes..) dresses look like and that's how I see the lace trimming on her dresses...

It was a pretty last minute decision to have that random "Drop strings", I just like the fact that it is "Dripping' with black lace..

Now, the cake board, I still can't believe the cake board (Oh right, speaking about the cake board I think/HOPE you have realized that is was completely FLAT, I decided to well.. Not have a usual FLAT cake board so I cut a random sized round styrofoam into half and filled the rest with royal icing.. And BOY it was HEAVY! I made like.. 3 1/2 batches of the Wilton RI to fill it up THEN put a sheet of fondant over it since I am HORRIBLE at icing cakes with RI and butter cream.. Yes, I still haven't mastered it, how embarrassing is THAT?!) is my favorite part of the ENTIRE cake!   

I was just doing some "table cloth" envisioning and decided that it would be a "Wiggly and squiggly" out line since... I can't really pipe a perfect circle free hand and all round a 20" board!

And a "Boarder" outside the outline just to make stuff more interesting, I can't (Know your weaknesses, you REAAAALLY do NOT want to mess up if you are piping black on white... Be adventurous only when you KNOW you can ERASE!) pipe perfect "Drop strings" on FLAT surfaces and put another boarder on that boarder to complete the look and another boarder "Outside" the "Table cloth". 

Anyone still following?      

I would like to say it's henna inspired but it really.. Isn't anymore, but that was what started it but somehow I guess it isn't all THAT Indianish, It has been Karen Cuppy Cakeyfied! 

Oh yes, the circles holding the "Table cloth" together, I'd like to say it's inspired by that "Chantilly lace" but it really, ACTUALLY, isn't..?

You know how I've been into Korean pop this days, well, their clothes, are simply eye catching and I noticed  this black net shirt in "oneee" of the music videos I was watching one fine day on replay/repeat and only THEN did I realized how nice it would be to use THOSE "circles" instead of those "lines" that I used for the baby blue lace tier!

Only later that day when I was surfing CakeCentral I saw a post on "Chantilly lace".. Strange, eh?

Well, what else can I say? I SUPER lurrrrve this cake board!! 

4.

Jeez, I just realized I didn't have a "Solo" picture of my..-  

Oh wait, I DO!

Oh well, you would have to endure the super blurness since it wasn't taking with my "Super duper" camera! 

I think this tier was indeed, SUPER fun! I love playing with colors and since I had that SK-sent-me-suitcase full of food coloring.. This is what I came up with, it was inspired by one of my "Colorfulish" ink pen drawings and a stained glass cake I saw on CakeCentral and as usual, it didn't turn out looking like it at ALL! Another cake, Karen Cuppy Cakeyfied!

It was all just random piping, joining them together and when you are too lazy to do the "blobs" just pipe some "Spider webs"!  

5.

Okay, lets start with the "Fantasy hydrangeas". I used the "tooth pick" method to make them paper thin, almost transparent, the same method I used for my very first flowers, they were "so-called" daisies and they happen to be my Dad's favorite flowers.

He wanted me to make those flowers for the previous wedcakecomp (Read about it here: ICCA Annual Wedding Cake Competition 2010) but I refused because I thought they were well... Primitive? And he was pretty upset so this year, TADAH, you get a whole tier to yourself Papa! Wide grin* 

Oh yes, I used a simple Wilton (I think..) blossom plunger for them, made them into "Hydrangeas" by cutting out a petal then "Veining and squashing" them with a toothpick!

I really love that little "Cascading" (?) effect down the cake and in white and grey, beautiful!

Okay, moving on to the very..- Oh wait, There is another tier (The grey and black mosaic tier/s with hand painted Patchwork cutter gum paste butterflies around it, placed in "Hidden Mickey" shape! I wonder if any one spotted that "Hidden Mickey"...) , can't believe I REALLY forgot to take any photos of that tier (It's the tier just above the black lacey one, with the rose in the center, it has some foliage but it isn't all that visible in the photo.).. Anyways, that particular tier was inspired by the base of THIS cake (I think they called it the wedding of the century or something so, let me rephrase that.. THIS Wedding of the century cake, the only thing that REALLY caught my eye was the base, no offense! I had never seen the tiers being placed like that, ever. So as usual, I love unique stuff!): 

I think you are probably wondering why the tier below it AKA the Black lace tier isn't a "Hidden Mickey" as well it simply because.. It it... Grew.. Fungus... ARRRGGGHHHH (Read about it here, you may have to scroll down a little though..:Bothers )! And how could I have known that all the cakey shops I went to did have anymore (No, not a single one..) 6" round styrofoam dummies?! Yeah, I kinda dumped the whole thing, I don't.. Think very well when I get angry...

Whew, I guess I'm done doing the entire list on "Inspiration" for Ebony?

Erh, where should I start? 

I think the night before would be good.. What a SUPER crazy day, I mean night it was! Actually the past few days were as well, no time to eat or.. Drink because time would fly by so fast and before I knew it, it was night fall already and I was "Hey! I only had a slice of bread and butter and a cup of water for breakfast! No wonder I'm starving..". I'm pretty glad that'd over, funny how when you're working you can't feel how hungry you are, only when you stop... You can practically feel your stomach juices eating into you but there's still SO much to do! Funny how those few days relate SO much to this quote (Or whatever you call those stuff..) I saw somewhere. "I am most productive at the last minute"

Well, I REALLY didn't enjoy the last few days. It was basically "Wake up, work, work some more, and more then sleep"..

The night before the competition, at 12AM I still had SO much (As in calyxes to wire and put on the roses, oriental grasses and some other foliage to dust, ALL the foliage to glaze and some other stuff to touch up and stuff..) to do and I was practically doing them with my eyes closed because well... They wanted to rest?

Not long after my "Taxi drivers" (My family, I was working in my Uncle's apartment.. By myself... I am not exactly someone who enjoys being alone, am too used to having Stinky fly, Honey bear and Fluffy head around I suppose.. And at the same time I can't STAND having them around!) came to pick me up and I STILL wasn't done yet.. I suddenly burst out in tears, I am really not sure why... May it was because I missed them or maybe because I had enough of playing with that -bbblleeeppps- gum paste or maybe I was tired.. And hungry, even though there was a load of food in the fridge but it would waste 10 minutes of my PRECIOUS time eating, I vote all of the above!  

Mommy forced some food down my throat and Papa helped (No, he didn't help with anything else, I swearies.) me do some dusting and glazing while I made the calyxes, sob..

Soon Mommy left with the boys since they were tired and I stayed on with Papa till 2AM and.. We had to get up at.. 6AM, niceee.  

The next morning, I mean that same morning when I got up, I had that "Did I even SLEEP?!" feeling as I went up to get dressed and go on a panicy search for some sort of a cloth as a "prop", apparently it adds extra points, I find it stupid. So some one who had HUMONGOUS, beautiful props and a lousy cake would win as well? Ehh....?

I was pretty relieved (As in JUMPINGOVERTHEMOOOOOONWITHJOYYY type of relieved!!) when I went digging in my Aunt's closet and found a nice goldish, shinee shiny curtain!

A very sleep and kinda grumpy Papa drove us over to the apartment to pick up the cakes and OFF we went!

  One of the worst feelings in the world (I think) is probably driving with a cake, a cake you have worked on for an entire month.. I felt VERY sick during the journey to Sunway Giza, as in that vomitish feeling, the exact same feeling I had last year even though I kept asking myself "Whats there to be nervous about??!", one of those feelings when singing "Genie" doesn't help..

After some very sloooow and smooth driving, I practically had a heart attack when Papa went over a bump he didn't realized was there and all the cakes went "JUUUUUUMP"!

I think I death glared Papa to death.. Papa said he was glad I didn't have a craft knife near me or he would have been murdered. 

The first thing I did once the car was pared was to check on the oriental string work tier, WHEW! It was fine, only the of ALL parts the front part was crushed.. Niceeeee.

Carrying the boxes up was... Torturous because I felt like I was going to vomit on them or maybe trip on the steps because my legs felt like jelly...

It was pretty surprising being the first one to arrive, I was the 23rd last year, Ah.. I remember the number of my cake so clearly.

After placing all the boxes at the table, there was certainly NO time to unpack, ran to the toilet (Am glad I know Giza like the back of my palm, even though I don't look at my palm too much but err... Weird person who invented that saying..) and -CENSORED-! (I have a feeling that shouldn't have been written in my blog but err.. I don't have a diary anyways!)

I felt much better after that though (Better as in able to sing and dance Genie with a hop and a skip!), thankfully. 

Later it was all smearing RI everywhere, stacking Ebony up, fluffing the curtain, randomly placing gum paste rose petals on the curtain, florist taping the calyxes to the roses (Didn't have time to last night, too.. tired..), florist taping the berries, seed pod that wasn't the poppies (Who knew Poppy seed heads was the ingredient to make heroin?! I have drugs on my bouquet, hahaha!), arranging the sprays and piping the fish net!

Even though I was the first to arrive I was the last or third last to leave the "rink", it was pretty scary when the staff went "Five minutes mooorreee" and I wasn't even complete piping the fish net all round, my hands got SO shaky that my piping tip poked the already-piped-fishnet and a HUGE piece from of ALL places the FRONT (I know right... I swear the front part of the cake is jinxed.) dropped.

Another going-to-cry (I wish I was those "Kick the wall and then feel better" people..) part, I am not someone who works best under pressure even though I overheard that I piped pretty fast but I don't exactly consider myself a fast piper...    

Above: Rosalind judging my cake

After I was done (I guess you could call it that.. But I would have liked to get at least like.. 10? "Layers" of fishnet..) Nina (She was my "Best friend" or like Papa puts it, "Best fan". I used to arrive super early at ICCA Hartamas when I was taking my Wilton courses, Nina and I would chitchat for ages, she would usually bring some cupcakes and I would help her ice them.. Yeah, I miss those days.) whisked me off for "Coffee", also known as breakfast since she said I was feeling too jumpy!

Went for some pastry, I had my favorite mushroom and chicken pie, YUM.

It indeed made me feel less jumpy, met another contestant there, chitchatted some more... 

And when we went back to the "rink" the judges (Rosalind Chan, Lorraine Mckay, ALAN DUNN, Amy Beh and... I don't like that guy.) were already judging!

NOOOO! I wanted to see Rosalind judge my cake, at least Papa took photos...     

Above:

Lorraine (It was strange, I didn't expect her to look SO petite.. I had a tough time spotting her!) judging my cake.

Below:

Alan judging my cake!!

I absolutely loved how both the "International" judges took time to judge the cakes, Alan actually went around with a chair and his favorite beverage (I soon learnt it was since you can NEVER find him without it by his side!), COKE.

Alan (The rest started at cake #1 AKA mine, of ALL people HE had to start at the other end..) started at the far end from my cake and I had to wait, wait, wait some more, have lunch, wait some more, wait and FINALLY he judged my cake but in quite a hurry because he was already late for the "Opening ceremony".. Sigh.

Alright, my fingers and eyes feel tired so I'm going to say this,

Ebony got "Highly commendable" (On the last day I was pretty glad I was there first since I would hear their comments first! Can't exactly remember everything, only the "important ones".. First of all the one that has been ringing in my head until today is that my calyx was placed upside down! When Alan pointed it out I burst out laughing like there was no tomorrow! I must have been super sleepy when I was wiring them, bwahahaha! Rosalind says the colors apparently are pretty dull and wouldn't want to have it as a wedding cake, then she asked me if I would. In my head I was going "DUH" but I tried not to show it outside, who wouldn't want a GOTH wedding?! -Crickets chirping- I guess I'm the only oneeee! Alan said I should take flower arranging classes, I kinda figured that out.. Rosalind said it would be better if there weren't the "blobs" behind the oriental string work. Everyone LOVED the lace! Alan said he would like to see a cake with JUST lace and he loved my flowers! Cries happily* Yeah, that's all I remember.) and here are my favorite cakes: 

Loties of lurvies,

-Karen Cuppy Cake

Bear Reese

Tum tum tum tee tum too teeeeeee tum... Grin* 

I am fairly (More like VERYLY! But... I am not going to get too over excited, it spoils my calm image.) pleased with my berries (Forgot what they are called, saw them in one of Alan Dunn's books but they look lie mulberries so I shall just call them that, even though they are a little too round.. So you shall call them mulberries all because I am too lazy to walk to my cakery, flip open the book, search like crazy through the pages and tell you, aren't I evil?)

This is my very first time making berries (Now I am getting addicted to making seed pods as well! Both berries and seed pods are SUPER easy to make and they give a nice "Fun" look to a err... Bundle of flowers!), never wanted to try them before because they looked a little tough but after reading (I don't really like Alan Dunn's instructions in his books, it's somewhat hard to read. So I usually flip through unless one really catches my eye.) through the whole thing it seemed quite simple.

Roll a ball of gumpaste, stick a wire through, roll a few billion tiny balls (A simple task but rather time consuming, nearly died of boredom..), stick them on to the bigger blob of wired gum paste, cut loads of stamens up into small bits, stick them into random small blobs, once dried DUSTDUSTDUST (I LOVEEE dusting sugar flowers, I have no idea why.. It's just SUPER fun!) and GLAZE (Anyone want a tutorial on this paticular berry?).. Ooh ahh..

Speaking about the awesome word called GLAZE..

Here's a short story by Karen Cuppy Cake:

One fine afternoon a girl was making some berries and weird-can't-remember-the-name seed pods, there was something bothering her it was the fact that she couldn't complete the entire berry and seedpod because she didn't have any edible glaze to make the berries and seedpods err... SHINE!

And also that the fact that her other foliage won't look "realistic" as well. (Note* I know that girl very well and she want's to win the competition and go to UK, full stop.)

So she got her father to get a bottle of it for her and she started "painting" (She couldn't find a spray one.) her gum paste foliage the next day and when she opened the cap the smell nearly killed her because it smelt like... Note* It took her about 5 brain cracking minutes to realize what it smelt like because she hadn't smelt that smell in YEARS!

Note* Found this photo on the net, I don't own it. I was pretty surprised it even came up!

Anyways, yes THAT was what it smelt like! 

Anyone else remember playing with these? I remember blowing them when I was like, 5 or something and it smelt SOOO chemically, bleackh.

Imagine having to endure that smell for err... SOME time, it makes we somewhat faintish as well, yeesh.

AND! I have a question, I hope it is a good one. 

IS EDIBLE glaze even EDIBLE?! It smells full of chemical and the "Ingredient label" says it's made of (Runs to cakery and back*): Food grade refined bleached lacquer, whatever liqueur.. Err, I mean lacquer is, it doesn't smell good that's for sure.

Now it makes me think.

My all time favorite almond coated milk chocolate is coated with glaze.. YUCK! Let's pray it isn't the the same edible glaze that I used on my berries today because I will still be eating them no matter what, HAH.   

    But ever since I started caking I have "weaned" myself of a couple of my favorite foods, mainly those that contain VEGETABLE SHORTENING, I just find food that contain vegetable shortening.. Yucky.

I get eggstreamilee happy when I see a cupcake boutique anymore because.. Mine are the best, no really.

A couple I have been to after I started baking, their cupcakes make my teeth feel funny, like, squeaky... I wonder what's in them... 

Signing off from another one of my random cakecomp updates!

-Karen Cuppy Cake

How to: DIY Gumpaste rose veiner

Omsk to you and you and you! Didn't expect to be back so soon but I guess you followers must be praying hard, eh?

ANYWAYS (I hereby swear that I will use this word in every post I post this blog of mine.), I was in my caking room one fine afternoon after lunch wanting to start on some gum paste roses since my hands were rather tired from all that RI piping, even though I hadn't started piping yet that day I already was, mentally, I suppose.

Not long after gathering most of my tools I realized my "paint brush veiner" (It was an old wooden paintbrush which I turned into a veiner by using my craft knife to kinda cut very slightly all around the paintbrush handle vertically.) was missing so... I decided to make another and also decided to make it into a short tutorial since I haven't made one in some time and I missed making one (You get hooked onto it, somehow.)!

Saw some florist wires laying around on my table I cut out the day before to make the wired petals and then the idea just hit me. BLONK*

Stuff you need:

30 Gauge wire (Actually it doesn't really matter it's up to you how "big" you want the veins to be but 30 gauge seems to be the best.)

Any type of tape

A wire cutter and scissors to cut the wire and tape.

I am pretty sure every cake decorator has these right? Proves how easy (And inexpensive compared to store  bought ones!) it is to make a rose veiner!

 Step 1:

Take about 4 "strands" of wire.

Step 2;

Chop each wire into three, you should end up with this white wire-y mess.

Step 3:

Cut some tape and wrap it around the middle, make sure all the wires are at different lengths and........... You are DONE! I hope you didn't expect it to be extremely long! 

Mmm... This post seems a little too short to end so lets test the veiner, eh?

1. Lalala... Roll out some gum paste to the usual transparent-ish, chomp out some petals with a cutter.

2. Deep breath* Place your veiner on the petal, use your index finger to roll it with a tinge of pressure from one corner to the other.

3. Roll your ball tool all round the edges of the petal (My thin foam pad kinda disintegrated and not long after I realized my palm was better than the foam pad! I also like the fact that the back of my petal doesn't get that "spongy texture" which I have always hated seeing in my roses from day one! One of the reasons why I like making freehand roses better!) and WALAH! I hope you can see the veins properly, I am a lousy photographer, I think I have mentioned that before. 

4. Add a few more rounds of petals (Continue making your rose here, you may want to skip the petal making part though.) and TADAH! (Excuse mess.)

Eeee... Feeling so slippery sleepy now and I have riding tomorrow, good night me lovelay followers! Huge sleepy smile*

-Karen Cuppy Cake

Oink

Above:

A close up picture of my first (EVER! If you must know...) gum paste pig, stuffed a half eaten (I hope you can see the eaten part...) gum paste (Remember how I said I bought 2 tubs of Satin Ice's gum paste when I was in KL? Got to use it yesterday for Mr Piggy! Dries quick, I think quicker than Wilton's and it doesn't have those hard, dried up bits like Wilton's! Satin Ice, my new favorite gum paste. It's probably going to be some time before I can afford the fondant though...) chocolate chip in his hand, I think it was a very nice touch and the bow tie! Try spotting the stitch marks... Wanted to make a blue jeans jumper for it but I think it looks better nude, with a bow tie! Hahaha!

Oink... You probably guessed what this post is about already, yep you got it.

BIRDS!

Say what?! Psshh... Are you SURE birds don't go "Oink"? 

I swear I heard a bird go "oink" yesterday...

Oh fine, you win.

Piggies go "oink"!

Like that one? Points above*

 Was pretty excited when I got an order from my Grandma (For her son's AKA my uncle's 40th birthday and he's born in the year of the pig so that's how the pig thing came around and she wanted the pig to be lazing around and holding up a sign that says "I AM 40"! Did some research on the net and browsed through my "Cartoony" cake books and this is what I came up with.) for this cake topper (Yeah, she didn't want her favorite butter cake, poo. Oh well I wouldn't have time to make it anyways, need to get to work on my competition cake! Have been delayed too much already!) since I have ALWAYS wanted to make a gum paste pig (Actually I like making any gum paste animal... Really hate those orders that I have to follow some Disney character because it limits my creativity, yuck.), probably my toothbrush holder is a pig and the rubber thing that it's made out off looks like gum paste so after staring at it twice a day... You would want to make it? Hahaha! I don't think it's a very good excuse but you'll have to deal with it!

  

Above:

Mr Piggy's picnic on a mud puddle (Yes, the cake topper is in two seprate pieces, was afraid if I put it on only one big mud puddle it would break when I transferred it onto the cake, so this was a my solution. Well, actually it was because I made the pig a little too fat and there wasn't enough space for the rest of the picnic so I had to roll out another brown piece of gum paste but I think the one up there sounds like a better explanation, doncha think so?).

Each baby blue plate is about an inch wide, so I guess you can estimate the size (Speaking about size.. Check out the silver, dusted it with silver luster dust but it doesn't show much in this photo, fork and the teaspoon which is even smaller in the photo above.) of the rest.

I didn't know making miniature food (Making the cake, I think it looks more like an orange cake than a chocolate cake like I planned..., was exceptionally fun! Playing with the runny royal icing and making the extremely tiny pink strawberries!) out of gum paste was so fun!

Let's hope I get more miniature gum paste food orders, yeah?   

The first thing that popped into my mind when my Grandma said she wanted a "lazy" pig I thought about it sitting down in a mud puddle (What's a pig without it's mud puddle? The mud puddle part probably came from this book I had, I think I still have it, about this YELLOW pig that lived in a farm with an elderly couple and it's pig sty had this nice soft mud he sleeps in and one day the farmer's wife decided to clean up his sty and sucked up all his mud so he decided to run away. So first he came across this swamp and he thought it looked soft and went it but he got attacked by the snakes and bugs who lived there so he decided to go some where else and somewhere else again, you get the point. And alas he wondered off into the city were he got stuck in the recently made tar road! So soon there was a huge crowd around the yellow pig and the poor elderly farmers that were looking everywhere for their lost pig found it and brought it back home and while he was away it rained so he had his mud puddle back! Oops... I think I got rather carried away with my story telling, so yeah, pigs must have their mud puddles!) and what's a pigs other favorite thing?

DOOOOF!

Errh... I mean.. FOOD! Yeah, food! Smiley face*

 Above:

A not so close up view of Mr Piggy in his mud puddle with his good cuppa joe, I originally planned it to look like tea and I put three REAL cubes (Or crystals.) of sugar next to the cup, tiny teaspoon (Which was very fun making!... And not so fun dusting cause it didn't feel like keeping still.), a tiny pot of sugar (Also filled with real sugar crystals.) and the "I Am 40" sign my Grandma requested for which was painted freehand with some black gel food coloring, excuse my icing sugar shaker at the back, the sign is only meant to be stuck when we reach the party, don't want anything breaking/falling down during delivery!

Below:

Basically the whole set!

Just imagine a real cake underneath it not a piece of square styrofoam.  

Hope you enjoyed viewing lazy Mr Piggy as much as I (REALLY) enjoyed making him and his picnic!

May a pile of cupcakes fall on you right now,

Karen Cuppy Cake