no dress rehearsal

the best laid plans of mice and men

We were cooking with gas, Dean and I. A few weeks back, with the holidays fast approaching and the new year right on it's heels, we decided to do our very best to get the house renovation completed before 2009 was celebrated. The free time we'll have once making this shell into a home is finished is mind boggling, let me tell you. What will we do with ourselves? Visions of evenings of crafting, curling up to watch movies and actually decorating for holidays are dancing in my head.

So, things moved along upstairs. The drywall is up, plastered and mostly painted, some flooring is down, heaters are installed. Dean and I ordered a new mattress that will be ready for pick-up on December 20th. It looks like we'll actually be ready for furniture set-up on the top floor by then, and move ourselves out of the basement for good. I was managing to accomplish a few things in the house everyday.

Then, I started feeling really tired. While out shopping, I was trying out different mattresses. Laying on one at Sears with my feet dangling over the edge, looking up at the florescent lights on the ceiling and listening to an awful version of "All I Want for Christmas is my Two Front Teeth" piped in through the tinny speaker system, I almost felt like I wasn't there at all. Like I was reading a novel, but wasn't one of the characters. When I noticed I was getting increasingly short of breath, I headed to the doctor, and was diagnosed with pneumonia, with fever. Forget renovations, yesterday I was so tired from getting a shower I took a nap afterwards. No longer am I cooking with gas. Actually, I don't think I'm cooking at all, and PB&J sandwiches or take out is currently the order of the day.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm certainly not the one doing all the major work on the house. It will continue to move forward thanks to Dean, and a few family and friends who have been more than helpful. Right now, I'm more the detail and touch-up girl. Still, now that I've been demoted to "nap and antibiotic girl", it's bound to affect the schedule.

Luckily, I have most of the Christmas presents not only bought, but wrapped. All but gifts for my mother-in-law, her husband Tony and Dean's great aunt, who are last on the list simply because I have no idea what to get them.

This year, I went for silver and light turquoise papers with red grosgrain and wired silver ribbons. Because we are not putting up a tree this year and we don't have much room to keep wrapped presents safely stored and dust free, I've already delivered my mom's family and my dad's family gifts to their respective houses.

I missed my own work Christmas party this weekend but did go to Dean's, which was last Friday. I was starting to feel pretty crappy even a few days before that, but was glad to get out and spend a little time with our friend Schroeder, who now works in western Canada but is a very good friend of ours since he and Dean worked together in New Orleans. He happened to be in town for the St. John's party this year. I'll have to post a few pictures of that evening in the next few days, when I have the energy to get the photos off the camera.

I'm also hoping that I have the energy to complete a few little holiday gifts I was going to craft (or bake) for co-workers. Does anyone have any suggestions for quick and easy food (preferably sweet) gifts? I was going to try to make some decorated cupcakes, but I don't think I can handle the decorating a cupcake will require.

I have continued doing cakes, though lately I have been putting that on hold also in favor house renovations. Two fall wedding ones have been among my favorites. One I don't have a photo for right now, but here's another, given as a gift from myself and my mom for mom's neighbor's daughter's wedding.

Here's a close-up of the leave and pumpkin detail, which I thought was quite cute. I have to do a cake for a December 20th party a co-worker of Dean's is hosting that we are invited to, as well as help my niece decorate cupcakes for her class on Monday night, so I'll be busy with the baking and decorating side of things.

I hope everyone's holiday preparations are going well! Now, if I can only figure out what to get my mother-in-law...

10 on tuesday - friday photo edition

1. Hurricane Gustav, thanks for ruining our travel plans for a fun long weekend in New Orleans. This is as close as Dean and I got to the Saints game on Sunday - sitting in front of the television watching it, thanks to our purchase of the "NFL Sunday Ticket" package earlier in the day. We did wear our jerseys, snack on Superdome-like food, and cheer, which was fun. And the Saints won. Undefeated in the season!

2. I've begun to unpack some of my scrapbook and sewing supplies, so when Dean requested I pick up some gummie bears for a co-worker of his who has been helping him out lately, I did up this jar. Just a simple, 2 minute little craft, but it was nice to get my hands on some of my old stuff that's been in storage for a year.

3. I used a coupon at Michael's to get a frame for my "keep calm and carry on" poster. Perhaps I should have sprung for professional framing, which would have surely corrected the wrinkles and creases caused by the big old dent in the poster tube that occurred somewhere between the UK and here. Or, as sweet Katy pointed out, I could look at the creases and be reminded to be calm. I know it's not a perfect fit, but I'm trying to be frugal here, with the jar budget system still in effect.

4. Last night, Dean was heading upstairs to continue to install drywall and asked if I would come up. I was busy resigning myself to a long evening of being a drywall assistant, when Dean said, "No, I don't need your help. I just want someone to keep me company so I'm not bored". So I filled the tub with nice hot water, added bubbles, took a lovely bath, and chatted with my buddy. He was working in our bedroom, the next room over. Here he is, busy putting up sheets in the newly built closets.

5. I also did a bit of reading in the tub. Though I don't watch Oprah on television, her magazine seems to be one that inexplicably jumps into my buggy in the checkout line at the grocery store. "Too busy to live?" she asks. Why yes, Oprah, I am - how did you know? And is there advice inside for how to turn it around?

(Magazine sitting on the newly tiled bathroom floor, dirty as it is right now)

6. Here's a little peek at one corner of our kitchen. We've just finished tiling and grouting the counter with black granite tile and the back splash with tumbled marble mosaic tile. I'm in the process of facing the salvage yard purchased cabinets with veneer and finishing the doors. All in all, we've done this kitchen quite inexpensively. The beautiful limelight hydrangeas are compliments of my mom and her garden. They begin a lovely bright green and fade to ivory as the blooms mature.

7. I did my biggest wedding cake yet last week. It's my policy to not decorate any cake I haven't baked myself, but after a request from a sweet bride that I couldn't refuse, I broke my own rule and decorated her grandma's fruitcakes. Let's say it was a nightmare and I now remember why I don't do it, but the cake did turn out nicely, I think. I don't know what Bran puts in her fruitcakes, but boy, was the finished product heavy. I could barely lift it.

(I should point out this was not my design, but one the bride picked a picture of).

8. Fall is in the air - it's getting chilly and we've been talking about (eekkk) turning on the heat. When I brought Abby out to play yesterday evening, I was cold. Where did the summer go? And, more importantly, why didn't we attend to the stuff needed outside the house before now?

9. One thing I do look forward to as fall approaches is the changing of the leaves. I love the rich, gorgeous golds, reds and browns  that the cooler weather brings. Here's one of my nan's maple trees in October of last year.

10. Another thing I look forward to as fall comes - the food. I do like that fruits, veggies, salads and lighter fare of the summer, but there's just something about the heartier offerings of autumn. Last night, we had homemade roasted asparagus and carrot bisque and grilled apple, spinach and brie sandwiches. I love when the house is filled with the spicy cinnamon, apple, pumpkin and maples scents, which hit you as you walk in a warm home from the cool weather outside. So cozy!

first wedding cake

We're continuing to be busy bees in the Moakler household. Dean has been working long hours and, though I continue to get a bit quicker with my paperwork, I've been working more than I expected at the clinic. My mom's side of the family had relatives in town last week, and now my dad's whole family has come home from far and away for my Nan tracey's 80th birthday celebration. Her cake is in the oven as we speak, and I'm thinking I'll decorate it in a knitting theme, as it's one of nan's passions.

Dean and I were out to supper last night with an old friend from New Orleans, who is here on business. How nice it was to see Schroeder again and catch up. A friend of mine from occupational therapy school, Brenda, was in town last weekend. Many of the old OT girls got together for a mini reunion. Speaking of OT girls, one of my classmates, now my co-worker, got married last Friday. The wedding was beautiful. Jen was a gorgeous bride and had Murray's Pond Country Club, where both the ceremony and reception were held, decorated in such a simple, elegant way.

I did the cake, and was so nervous about it. Jen is very crafty, a "Martha Stewart" type, and quite a perfectionist too. Plus, I was going to actually be at the event. I like to drop a cake off and leave. Being there, I tend to look at it all night, and worry about it. "Oh, I think it's drooping a bit there" or "Oh my, it doesn't look very straight at this angle". 

Overall, the cake held up pretty well, especially considering how hot it was that day (and combine that with the fact there was no A/C at Murray's Pond). Jen wanted something simple, yet elegant, and with fresh flowers on the top. I had never put real flowers on a cake before, but when I arrived at the florist that morning to pick them up, she gave me a few pointers. Here's a picture of it, after set up that day:

Feels good to have my first wedding cake under my belt, and one that everyone seemed to enjoy.

a spring tea party

My grandma called last week and asked me if I could make a cake for her sister Lucy, who was turning 89 years old. Lucy still lives on her own up the southern shore, reads the paper to stay informed, looks like she would blow away in a strong wind and constantly yells at you because her hearing is so poor.

I was a bit stumped as to what kind of cake I should do for an 89th birthday. Nan's response to what she was looking for in a cake was a typical grandmother's: "Oh, nothing too fancy, whatever you'll find easiest". I decided on a "spring flower tea party" theme, as Lucy is a tea drinker and I though spring colors would remind everyone what season it should be, even though outside is still rather dismal.

Nan really loved the cake, and I hope Lucy enjoyed it too.

I loved making the little fondant flowered teapot and cup, complete with sugar cubes and a stirring spoon.

Speaking of spring, where are you? We are having snow with high winds and blowing snow for the third day in a row, and our five foot fence around the backyard has drifts so high, Abby will soon be able to walk right over it to the neighbor's (where I'm convinced she'll promptly eat the cat who has been teasing her all winter long).

Yes, I'll take some cheese with my whine, thank-you. Perhaps a nice brie or a sharp cheddar.

the beginning...

Now that the house is moving along swimmingly, and I'm hearing the happy and comforting sounds of Liam installing our kitchen sub-floor (who knew I'd grow to love the sounds of power tools so completely?), I began reflecting on what I'll do when the house is all finished. You know, something to occupy my mind while I'm waiting for that first coat of touch up plaster to dry downstairs.

There has been two main options all along - go back to work as an occupational therapist, or start myself a new business: tanya moakler cakes. There are benefits to each, that's for sure. Going back to therapy has a level of familiarity to it, and I know I'll be getting a paycheck and contributing to the financial part of our household once again. I'll never be rich as an OT, but it's a good living. Yet the cake decorating appeals to me in so many ways: it's a creative outlet and I feel a passion for it I don't think I've ever felt at work doing anything else. I've always been a crafty type, even as a little girl. Owning my own business has never really been something I aimed for, or something that ever appealed to me. But that chance seems to bring with it a certain amount of flexibility and a feeling of autonomy over work life, though it comes hand in hand with a lot of responsibility and hard work. Some days I feel certain that I'll go back to the world of a therapist, but others I'm sure I'll take the path of a cake designer.

I owe the privilege of having this option to my very dear friend Nikki.  She lives in New Orleans, and is a wonderful stay-at-home momma to her 3 darling kiddos, who Dean and I love dearly. We passed many an evening at their place, being fed and entertained by Nik, her husband Scott and the kids. Nikki is always feeding whoever drops by, always seems excited for company, and is always full of hospitality.

A year or more passed from the time we met to when I discovered she had her own little business baking and decorating cakes out of her home. She was just beginning to experiment with fondant icing right around that time and knew I was interested. When I had admired her cake skills and began asking questions, she invited me to come over to her house one Friday evening while she was decorating. We really didn't know each other all that well at the time, her brother worked with Dean and so we'd cross paths at an odd social function, but that was about it.

Well, after that one night, I was hooked. Countless Friday evenings over the next year, I arrived at Nikki's door to learn, and she patiently taught. Since she was new to fondant work, there were lots of things we ended up learning together, though she always did all the baking, buttercream, piping, and cake covering. I grew to be her trusty assistant, helping sculpt fondant figures and objects, cutting and shaping fondant flowers, clean up duty - whatever needed to be done.

And it was during those evenings, sitting across from one another at her kitchen bar, that we became such close friends. A special bond quickly formed between us as we'd chat away as we worked. Any and every topic came up: our pasts and futures, hopes and fears, failures and triumphs, problems and possible solutions. I could always be honest with her and trusted that she was with me too.

During that year, Nikki's skills sky rocketed, as did her number of orders. She was busier than ever, with groups of loyal clients booking her up weeks in advance. My skills began to improve too, and I finally got to a stage where I could actually be helpful. How many nights did we stay up until the rise of Saturday morning's sun, finishing countless orders? It wasn't a late night for us unless we were caking past those 4 am infomercials playing the greatest hits of one decade or another. I can't count the number of times we laughed and cried, how many problems we solved, how many cake near-disasters were averted.  How much fun we had.

Here's us, after an all-nighter of caking. We're looking rough indeed. But hey, it's at least 4 or 5 am by this point.

Yes, we have matching aprons. They say "cake girls are always sweet". I just couldn't resist when I saw them online, I had to get them for us. Here we are working on hand-painting a prada purse cake, she worked on one side and me on the other, at the same time. That's a testament of how well we could work as a team.

And here 's one of the finished cakes from that evening, the prada purse we were painting above. I enjoy stepping back and looking at a cake I've completed. It's especially helpful to walk away from it, and return a half hour later. It really helps you to see your product with fresh eyes, and adjust as needed. But it was so much fun to go back to cakes together. We'd each get so excited at some of our favorites. It's not quite the same now, without Nikki to get excited with.

So thank-you Nikki. You'll never know how grateful I am to you for sharing your dream with me, and how much I miss our Friday night cake marathons.   

welcome baby katie!

Hooray, my friend Ashley and her husband Rod are the proud parents of a new little baby girl. They have named her Katie and she looks as cute as can be in her pictures. I'm hoping to get over for a visit and meet her soon. Congratulations guys! I'm sure you'll be fabulous parents. xo

Speaking of new parents, my friend and college roommate is expecting her first child within the next couple of weeks. Erin lives in Corner Brook, which is a 7-8 hour drive from St. John's, so I don't get to see her very often. She is having a baby shower this weekend and, upon discussion with her mom (who lives in St. Johns but was heading out for the shower), it was decided I would do a cake. Sharon graciously agreed to bring it out with her. She was flying and took it as her carry-on luggage, which made me so nervous. It's tricky enough to transport a cake in a car, I just wasn't sure it would handle take-off and landing in a plane.

Well, she sent me a message today saying that both she and the cake made it intact. Hooray! I'm so glad Erin will get her gift from me. She has a farm themed nursery similar to Ashley's, though her bedding set is not the same. Still, a farm is a farm and has similarities , so I tried to make her cake different from Ash's barn yard shower cake I did a couple of weeks ago.

Here is the front of the cake. I made it two layers instead of three because I thought it would be easier to transport.

 

Here is the back side of the cake. There were so many cute little flowers and animals in blocks on the bedding, I had to go all the way around to fit them in:

Finally, here is a close up of Mr. Piggy, one of the little fondant animals I made. Mom ended up really loving him, so I made her another out of some extra fondant to place on her desk. She says this is her favorite of the cakes I've made so far.

Other than that, it's been more painting for me and putting up cove molding for Dean and Billy, which has been a difficult task indeed. With no walls straight and no 90 degree angles in this old house, it's not just cutting two ends at 45 and having them meet in the middle at 90. It's OK, nothing a little caulk won't fix : )

I know I've been saying I was going to take pictures of the walls to show the paint colors and progress, but I was wanting to take them on a nice, sunny day, when the rooms look bright and the colors look best. Alas, no sun here the last few days. So I'm hoping for sunshine and the completion of painting duties tomorrow!

moving right along

Today I delivered my first wedding cake. It was actually a cake for a wedding reception/party for a co-worker of Dean who was married in St. Lucia a coupe of weeks ago. I was so nervous. For one thing, I actually charged her for it. Now, the pricing was a less than what I will charge for something comparable  if I decide to make this cake thing into more a business and less a hobby. But still, it feels a little different when you are accepting money for something you drop off, not giving it as a gift. And I found the whole "wedding cake" title held more pressure for me than a birthday or shower.

Anyhow, Dean and I dropped it to them in the middle of a snowstorm this morning. We had discussed what she had wanted, and it seemed that she was looking for something tropical, elegant but still with a bit of whimsy. This is what I came up with:

It's hard  to see, but the palm trees, shells and pearls are brushed with a luster dust that gives them a nice shine. Everything was fondant with the exception of the flowers, which are gumpaste. I had never worked with gumpaste before, and I was pretty pleased with how they came out overall. I think the orchids looked pretty real.

I did a lot of different flavors for the cake's tiers - the bottom two are chocolate with a vanilla swiss meringue butter cream, but the bottom layer has a strawberry filling and the middle has a chocolate. The top is a carrot cake with cream cheese icing and a cinnamon filling. I also did  white almond cupcakes with a sweet almond icing.

Alas, the little hand held Sunbeam mixer I had been using at mom's while mine Kitchen Aid is in storage could not take it, and died right as I was mixing my second batch of chocolate cake batter. It started sounding funny, then smelling a little funny. Then a poof of smoke came out the back and it was finished. I can't blame the little thing, I think those small hand mixers that you can attach to a plastic base are usually used for whipping up occasional batches of Dream Whip, and was really not equipped to handle everything I threw at it.

I was in a panic. I had this big wedding cake order I was already nervous about, and now no mixer. What's a cake making fool to do?

I consulted Dean, and he suggested this:

http://www.costco.com/Browse/PopupViewer.aspx?prodid=10043022&whse=BC&lang=en-US&cat=4286

Bless his heart. Meet my new mixer. I am hoping we will share a long and loving relationship if I decide to get the cake business off the ground. Silver was the only colour choice. It mixes like a dream.

Other than the cake, my entire week has been spent painting and trying to restore long-neglected basement bead board ceilings. I'll post some pictures of the final colour choices tomorrow. Good-night!

baby walsh, arriving soon...

Yesterday I went to a baby shower for a dear college friend of mine, hosted by her sweet mom and her aunt. Getting pregnant was a long journey for Ashley, and everyone is so excited, eagerly awaiting the little one's arrival. Ash is looking fabulous and, at 36 weeks, the baby could certainly come at any time now.

Ash and her husband Rod have opted not to find out the sex of the baby. Seems to be a trend among all of my pregnant friends, just a small few are wanting to know if they are having a boy or a girl before baby's arrival. Not me. If I indeed ever get pregnant I'd be so on top of knowing as soon as I could. Especially if I was having a girl, you can bet it would be reflected in the nursery decor. Not necessarily all frills and poofs, but something with more of a feminine flair to it, to be sure.

The baby's room decor is the "My Little Farm" set, which is really sweet. I offered to do a cake for the shower, and based it off the bedding.

It was my very first three tiered cake, and I was happy with how it came out. The top layer is just a wee three inch round, so it took a bit to get used to icing and covering something so small, but any flaws I disguised by placing clouds around the sky.

Can't wait to meet you little one!