Week 30: More wood :)

This week I got to go to a really cool place: The Hardwood Store of North Carolina in Gibsonville.
Monday morning I got an email from Howard to ask if I was interested going as he and Mike were thinking about going. I had been wanting to go to the wood store for a while and was really excited to get a chance to go. 30 minutes later they were here to pick me up. Gibsonville is between Burlington and Greensboro down 61 North.
I didn't know what I expected the store to be like, but it was much, much bigger than I expected.
There were tons of woods to pick from. We easily spent 2 hours there looking at things and figuring out what we wanted to buy. I ended up getting several types of wood:
Wormy Maple- which is a beautiful light wood with dark designs all over it that I will be using for jewelry.
Canary- which is a beautiful yellowish wood with awesome lines which I'll use for my first sculpture.
Morado- which is a darker wood with the most amazing lines I have ever seen, which will be used for bracelets.
Paduak- which is the amazing orange colored wood I used for my first bracelet, which I'll use for more jewelry and the base for my sculpture.
Purpleheart- which as the name indicates has a purple tint to it. I am not sure what I'll use it for but I think it will all get used for jewelry.
(I'll spare you guys from pictures of each of the woods)

When we got back we helped Howard to put things away and he gave each of us an area to keep our own wood :) As you can probably tell, I am really excited about this new hobby.

Baking experiment of the week: Bracelet cake
As a small thank you to Howard I decided to make a cake. I knew from past experience that Howard really likes the flourless chocolate cake I make. I wanted to make it "wood" inspiered. Flourless chocolate cake is very rich so it really does better with very little or no icing. So I decided to make it into the shape of a bracelet. I didn't want to waste any cake so I decided to use my fill pans upside down and see how it turned out.

I covered it with chocolate fondant (the first time I have tried making chocolate fondant). I then painted the "wood" with food coloring. I am happy with how it turned out.

Thanks for reading!

week 28: Hope for RDU, Evos, brownie giant cookie

This past week Justin, Chris and I volunteered with Week of Hope. Every Summer our church spends a week doing projects around our city, and RDU. Our campus took on a couple projects one of them was E.K. Powe. We got to spend our morning cleaning classrooms and hall ways. We enjoyed getting to help out and look forward to what we may get to do next year.
We also had several things to celebrate this week: Justin's birthday, Chris's half birthday and the one year anniversary of Justin at Duke and Chris at RTI.
So, to celebrate we went to Evos, a "healthy" fast food place in Chapel Hill. Neither of us had ever been to it and it was ok. The best thing we had was their air fried french fries. I am not sure how they do it but they were actually really tasty and they don't use any oil. They are also known for having good milkshakes but we didn't try them on this trip. (We went to TCBY instead).

My baking experiment for the week:

As I have been baking so much lately Justin did not want a cake for his birthday. He wanted a brownie cookie instead. So Lena, Sebastian, Eva and I made Justin a giant brownie cookie. They then helped me cut out decorations. We added 20 circles and 5 stars to the brownie cookie. It turned out pretty tasty.

Thanks for reading!

Week 29: Wood workshop, bear cake, giant sugar cookie

This has been a few weeks in the making. Margie's neighbor Howard is an amazing sculptor. For a long while he has said that whenever I wanted to learn how to use his machines he would be happy to do it. So, while we were house sitting in late June/ early July I decided to take him up on it.
We decided to make bracelets as they are basically the simplest thing I could learn how to make.
I figured there would be a lot of steps but had no idea how many steps there were actually were.

First you need to pick your wood and measure 4x4 in squares

Then cut it into 4x4 squares
You then have to use the sanding machine (I have no idea what things are actually called) to level the wood. ( I don't have a picture of this step)

Than you have to glue all the wood together, in alternating grain directions for extra strength

Then you put it in this contraption and let the wood dry for at least 24 hours.
After it dries you are ready to draw out the bracelet

Than the cutting begins. In this picture Howard is showing me how to cut the outside of the bracelet on a solid piece of wood.

You then drill in a hole so you can use the previous machine to cut the inside of the bracelet.

You then cut out the inside of the bracelet

Than there are multiple steps to sanding the bracelet

First is the machine with the round attachment to sand the inside of the bracelet (this picture is just to show the machine)

Then you go back to the first sanding machine to even out the top and bottom, then you use the rounded side to get the details on the outside of the bracelet. After that you sand it by hand with 4 different levels of sand paper. Starting at a grade 150 and going all the way up to a 220 (I have no idea what that means).

This is a picture of my first bracelet before any of the staining

After that comes staining, 5 coats of it, and sanding with a level 400 sand paper between each coat after coat 2 with the drying time of up to 48 hrs between each coat.
While Howard and Jane were on vacation and Justin and I were staying with Georgia while Margie, Peter and the kids were at Disney I worked on a couple other bracelets as well.

(sorry the pictures are blurry, I'll try to get some better ones soon)

Baking Experiment of the week: Cookie cake
In my last order from Wilton I got a cookie cake pan. I decided to make a sugar cookie (as I had promised my students I would make cookies to bring to class). I decided to decorate it with royal icing. Unfortunately, I thinned out the icing too much so it ran a little. Overall, I am happy with how it turned out.
My other experiment was making a cake to match a kid's drawing.
It gave me a reason to buy a new pan and it was fun to do, it's also exciting that I got to sell another cake.
Thanks for reading!

Week 27: Cuban Revolution opening, volcanoes and zoo.

This past week I have had some great new experiences. A few months back while at the Ambacco (American Tobacco Campus) we found out that a Cuban Restaurant would be opening this summer. I am a big fan of good bread, black beans and rice, fried yucca so I was really excited. So, I decided to keep track of when it was opening. This Wednesday was the grand opening. Chris, Justin and I decided to go on opening night as I didn't have to teach this week. This included a few new experiences, a new restaurant, trying new food, and going to a grand opening of a restaurant all in one. To start off we order fried yucca. Every time I have had fried yucca it has been in big wide chunks, but these were breaded and shaped like regular french fries. They were pretty good but not what I was expecting. We also got bottom less chips with black bean dip. The chips were good. I didn't try the dip but, the guys liked it.

I really wanted to try the black beans and rice, but I also decided to try the Ropa Vieja (a tomatoe based beef stew) in honor of Katie, as it's one fo her favorite dishes, and she couldn't join us as she's traveling.

The Ropa Vieja was good, I would get it again. The black beans and rice weren't so great. I am not sure what they spice it with, but whatever it was I did not like it. I also had really high expectations as my grandma makes amazing black beans and rice.


Chris had a veggie wrap which he enjoyed.


Justin had a steak sandwich which he was really happy about.

I think overall, we all really liked the place. Chris and I decided we'll try new things next time and Justin will probably stick to his sandwich. There were a ton of options including all kinds of shakes and burgers if you don't want to be adventurous and try new things.

Now, for my baking experience of the week.
This week I had my first cake order for a kid's birthday party.
Hammond wanted a Zoo cake filled with animals and his mom wanted 24 cupcake volcanoes to go with it.
Like most kids, Hammond knew exactly what he wanted, an orange and vanilla cake. I have never done orange colored or flavored cake before but I think it turned out well. (I forgot to take a picture of it before I iced it.)
To start the zoo first I had to find animals to go on it, then I sketched it out. I iced the cake green, placed the animals on it so I knew were to draw my map. I then removed the animals made my paths and covered the zoo with grass, with the exception of the crocodile and part of the polar bear's habit which had to be water (blue died decorating gel).

I had never used decorating gel on cakes before, usually it gets mixed into the icing to help it run smoother, but I am really happy with how it turned out.

The cake turned out better than I expected it. When I agreed to do this cake I wasn't really sure how I was going to pull it off, now I would be happy to do other zoo cakes.

Now to the volcanoes. Right away I figured I would bake the cupcakes level off the tops and flip them upside down. I didn't think it would give me the shape and height I wanted so I decided to make mini cupcakes as well to put on top of them. This gave the cupcakes the right shape and height. It also gave me a chance to use two different chocolate cake recipes for a little something extra.
I experienced with different color combination and different amounts of lava. This was a tricky balance because people usually like cupcakes because of how much icing there is. So I had to find the right balance of lava, and cupcake to make these little volcanoes.
I don't know how often people order volcano cupcakes, but I would be happy to make these again!

Thanks for reading!

Week 26: Starting a cake site and more fondant

Since I started making cakes I have had people ask me if I sell my cakes. I have made many cakes for birthdays but have never sold any of them. Since I started teaching I have realized how much I really love making cakes. I also will be having the pleasure of making wedding cakes for 2 of my friends as their wedding gifts. So, I have started to bake, A LOT, there are lots of new cakes I want to try out. In the past week I have had 2 different people ask me if I would be willing to do cakes for them. After some thinking I have decided to take the advice of several people, start a simple site and see what happens.

I am really excited at the idea of getting to make cakes for other people's special occasions as I am sure the people around me are all getting sick of cakes.

This weeks experiment was a simple fondant covered, and fondant cut out cake for one of my students. It was her birthday yesterday so we decided to have a little surprise celebration.