baleful

I'm not exactly sure how it started.

Chip likes Halloween and decorating, so that certainly was a factor.
I also know a post on the YSS blog spurred it further.

So Chip popped by Love, Inc to check on what they had in stock for dolls and thus began the project. I came home from Zumba Saturday morning to find him starting on the hair, thinking he just got one to experiment. But, no, he had a whole pile of dolls!

He thought to start with linseed oil to stiffen the hair, but that proved to be messy and her hair took forever to dry. So he moved onto glue next, but I bet one could just spray paint a doll's hair and it would get to that zombie look in no time with fewer steps. 

At this point, I suggested we take all the clothes off so we could transform everything separately (and more easily), and we focused on getting the dolls themselves painted. We let them dry overnight and moved onto the dresses the next day.

Chip took charge of the project and did most of the painting (I didn't do any extras to the faces, for example) and hair arranging. I did fine tune the dresses a bit, though tried not to overdo. I think that's where this project can go south quickly--keep things simple! 

I also look forward to the elements making them even more zombie-like.

retract

Pondering plants and life again - how when plants are transplanted, they go through a phase of shock and ugly weirdness before the old deadness falls away and new growth and signs of life come again.... and no one questions that. It's ok when that happens to me, too. And thank goodness for those signs of life. -- Dina Kowal

We recently had to make a really hard decision: we reversed our acceptance and said we could no longer go forward with our referral. New information (finally) came our way last week and it seemed that the little boy wouldn't fit well with our family and it would be stressful for everyone involved. It was tough, as there were many signs that this was to be our match. But God is good, and I have felt peace at our decision (after we made it--up until then I was a wreck).

So we're back in the pool and back to strictly waiting. Getting the referral before we were supposed to did force us to finish up our dossier in a hurry, which was good. We've also had the 'being on the same page' idea reinforced by this, which is also good. 

A few other tidbits:

• What to expect when travelling to pick up your child.
• You may be tired of the introvert articles, but I still really appreciate them. Here's one on parenting that doesn't say too much new, but I appreciated a couple of points, particularly the one about others not getting offended if I need to say no to an activity, but please still ask.
• Another great list of things you need to know before and during travel.

didactic

Hooray for another birthday party for which I could bake and decorate cake!

Last year, the birthday girl gave me some vague directions for what she wanted as her special cake. This year, I got a drawing. In color!

I told her I would get it as close as possible and set to work. 

I kept a few cake pans from my grandma, including some that are heart shaped, so that part was easy--no cutting corners and reassembling to create the base. I also figured I'd make the seven little hearts separate and add them to the top (rather than create them directly on the cake) and they'd work perfectly for candle spots.

The colors weren't going to be as strong as the markers she used, but I made sure there were distinctions between the different elements. The other issue I ran into was her drawing was pretty wide and my cake pans are narrow... so I rearranged a few elements and ended up with a pretty nice looking cake.

M commented on the color being off*, but said she loved it and it was really pretty, so that didn't matter. When it was time to sing Happy Birthday, we loaded it up with silver candles and had a boisterous round of song.

Almost missed this shot--she was speedy!

Then we cut and served. I knew we couldn't cut traditional wedges, like a round cake, nor could we make easy squares, like a rectangle cake, so a couple girls got wonky shaped pieces. They didn't mind in the least, though. M told all her friends I'm the best cake baker ever, which was very sweet of her. 

*I was not offended in the least, as I completely understand. Getting dark red/pink colors are hard!

dystectic

I had the urge to make marshmallows again before it got too humid, so I asked Chip if he had any special requests. He said 'peanut butter'.

The only recipe I found quickly was on Bakerella's site. So I took my tried and true recipe, used some ideas from Bakerella, and added some pb while the sugar was still hot and whipped up a batch.

Intense peanut butter flavor! Not very fluffy marshmallows.

I borrowed the marshmallow book from the library, just for more inspiration, and got set to try again. And then the humidity came. I had to put my marshmallow making on hold until after summer was over.

So round two had a little less pb and I coated the final product with powdered pb mixed with powdered sugar.

Man, the lighting in this shot makes them look sickly...

The pb taste was still intense, which is great, since I reduced the amount of pb in the mallow mix. Unfortunately, these were also decidedly 'unfluffy', which is the hallmark of a perfect mallow. In fact, these look even less fluffy than attempt number one! 

So it's back to the drawing board. I have two more ideas to try and will see if either of those methods give me the results I want. Stay tuned!

rehabilitate

I had hoped to get this post ready for World Cardmaking Day, but alas, I missed it. Finding time to craft when there are tomatoes to deal with is tricky...

Anyway, I saw a really fun idea on another blog about updating an old card and thought 'I've got lots of those' that would be fun to reimagine with all the new styles, techniques and equipment I have.

A lot of my old cards I couldn't figure out how I'd remake (my poor brain is a bit overloaded with Christmas cards at the moment), but I did find one that, though I still rather like it, could use a serious update.

I decided I'd keep the same basic color scheme, as well as the same stamp for the focal point. From there I sketched out a couple of ideas and got to work.

The original card is quite basic, so I stuck with that idea. I went for a blue background, made with Distress Ink Daubers (which react well with water), and then stamped the flowers directly onto that piece of watercolor paper. I needed to get the silver/gray idea in next, plus have some sort of accent piece, so I added some dashes with an embossing pen and silver powder.

Having the dashes go all the way around the edge felt like it would be too much, but now I'm wondering if I want to go back and finish it up that way. Otherwise, I like the new version very much and may make a couple more with different color schemes.

wonderment

This past weekend, a friend and I threw a surprise birthday party for her sister. The kicker was it was her half birthday, which doubled the surprise.

We knew it would be tricky to pull off the surprise on her formal birthday, as she had thrown a surprise party for her hubby earlier this year, so she'd already be expecting something. Or at least be on her guard and suspicious. I suggested we look at a half birthday party, and when perusing the calendar, we realized her actual half birthday was on a Saturday. Perfect!

Then the flurry of planning began and we invited family and friends, figured out the menu (we went with a soup bar--three kinds of soups, veggie platters, fun cheeses, breads, crackers) and I set out to pick out a cake.

Abigail leans towards fruity cakes with light or no frosting, so I grabbed my lemon cookbook and my big cake book. As the RSVPs rolled in, I realized the lemon cake I was leaning toward wouldn't be big enough. 

Thus, the Buttermilk Sponge Cake with Cranberry-Raspberry Preserves and White Chocolate Frosting* was created.

I love being able to make cakes in stages. The preserves I made three days ahead of time. The cake the day before, and the frosting I whipped up the same day as assembly.

Sugar syrup for frosting: this is about three quarters done--can you see how it's clear on the right and still a little thick on the left?

The book said I'd have a little leftover preserves, but I just put it all on the cake with no issues.

Our raspberry patch produced a few raspberries this fall (quite unusual), so I could grab some for a garnish, along with a mint sprig from the garden.

This cake turned out perfectly--the frosting is super light and not killer sweet, the preserves add a tart aspect and the cake is dense enough to hold up to the filling, but not so heavy the frosting is lost. I ate my piece the next morning and everything was still holding up quite well. The color does get a little purplish, rather than red, but it still looks pretty.

I'm sure you're all wondering: was she surprised? YES. We were completely successful and it took her half an hour to recover. Once she got over the shock, she had a blast and gladly took the spotlight as the guest of honor for the evening.



*Want the recipe? Get the book! Perhaps your local library has it.