Weekend in New Orleans

Tripp and I spent last weekend in New Orleans! We drove in Friday night after work, so we did not arrive until close to 11:30. We chatted with my parents and then headed to bed. Saturday morning, I got a great haircut from my very talented sister Claire. My mom, sister, and I met my dad and Tripp at Parkway Bakery for lunch. We enjoyed awesome ham, shrimp, and roast beef po-boys. I then ran errands with my mom.

After getting back to my parents' house, we got ready for the Light the Night Walk at a nearby park. Just in case you did not read an earlier post about the walk, it is a walk raising money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. A team was formed in honor of my dad for the walk. When we arrived at the park, we were surprised to see the amount of tents, tables, and food. Soon after we arrived, a group of my dad's co-workers, my mom's co-workers, family friends, aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents began arriving. We visited, enjoyed the food, and the live music.

Just before the actual walk began, we were treated to some entertainment from the 610 Stompers. What a way to get the crowds pumped up!! Then the walk began with each of us carrying a lighted balloon.  What a fun and successful night with over $180,000 raised to help find a cure for blood cancers!!!

Claire with her favorite brother-in-law!

Cousins

Tripp and I

Me and my dad

Dad's co-workers

610 Stompers

On the walk

Final Class!

 My cake class came to a close this morning. Our assignment was to design a cake, make the cake, make the icing, frost the cake, make flowers, dry the flowers, and bring it to class to decorate. Since I had a lot to prepare, I worked on little bits throughout the week. I made and tinnted icing on Tuesday, made flowers on Wednesday, make my cake on Thursday, and frosted the cake and gathered all of the materials on Friday. I cam up with a design consisting of a white buttercream frosted cake with orage colored ribbon roses, coral colored swirl drop flowers, coral colored rosette border, and orange colored dots scattrered on the cake. I had a few hiccups during the week, but I was ready to go for today! Here are some pictures of the preparation for today:

With all of my materials in hand, we got a lesson on writing with icing, a few other tips, some houseskeeping items handled, some help on ribbon roses, and we were off to decorate. Here is my final cake and my certificate from the class. I am roud of myself for completing the course and learning so many new things! Here's to baking!!!

Cake Class #3

So the lesson for cake class #3 was about cupcakes!! I was excited to learn how bakeries make their cupcakes look so pretty. We also learned how to make leaves and a few different flowers: drop flowers, swirl drop flowers, shaggy mum,  pompom flower, and a ribbon rose. Wow, flowers are not easy! The ribbon rose looks beautiful, but it not the easiest. I will never complain again about how much a bakery charges for cakes with flowers on them. It takes a lot of time and effort to make those cakes look that beautiful. Here are a few of my attempts!