Revisiting Ferdinand

When we go to storytime at the library, I will usually randomly pick up a few books for Millyana.  The last time we were there I picked up one of my childhood favorites, "Ferdinand the Bull."  I remember just loving it as a kid and when I was reading it to Milly before bedtime, I fell in love all over again.  The story is just so sweet and this time I could not stop looking at the illustrations.  The detail and intricacies of each illustration made me pause to study them before turning each page.  

The book is illustrated by Robert Lawson an artist born in New York City who began illustrating in 1922.  As I did more research on him, I discovered more beautiful illustrations that just make you have to stop and take a look.  It is that 1920's style that I just love. It is so detailed that when you look closer and closer you can't help but find little pictures hidden inside little pictures, like a sleeping elf or the little dipper sitting in the sky.   

Sweet Ferdinand

From Little Prince Toofat

New Eyeglass Case

I finally went in to get glasses.  I always tell myself I don't need them but this time I could truly see a difference.  And they are super fun!  Next step, search for the perfect super cute case to hold them in.  Well, I couldn't find a fun/cute case to meet my fun/cute standards.  Then I realized, DUH!  I should make one.  So I searched Pinterest to find the cutest case tutorial and found exactly what I was looking for at a blog called sewfantastic (what a so fantastic name!)
The tutorial is so easy to follow.  Mine came out a bit bigger than what I wanted but it was so quick and easy to put together, I can easily make another with a few adjustments on the measurements.  I used an old t-shirt that didn't fit anymore but I liked the design and colors so much I couldn't throw it away.  I used pieces of fabric from my scrap pile which is always a good thing.

Polka Dot Cake

My sister-in-law's birthday is in the beginning of the month and she wanted to spend it somewhere warm. My brother and sister-in-law just were not going to get that in Virginia so they planned a long weekend visit with us.  Hooray!  Unfortunately it was not quite as warm as it usually is in Florida while they were here but definitely warmer than Virginia.  We still packed in a lot of activities and even a trip to Anna Maria Island.  Their visit went by too quickly and can't wait for them to come again.

Now I really enjoy baking and was excited for the opportunity to bake a birthday cake for Ombretta.  I had seen this cake on Pinterest from the blog Once Upon a Pedestal and decided (at the last minute) this would be such a fun cake to try to make for her.  I always have these grandiose ideas of making these elaborate things and always seem to bite off more than I can chew.  But I still started putting it together a couple of hours before they were supposed to get here.  

I don't have many pictures of the preparation because, like I had said, I was whipping this together at the last minute.  The original blog post has great step by step instructions.  I will just throw in my 2 cents.  I started off with one white cake mix.  I prepared it following the egg white steps so I would not get the yellow tint from the yolks like the blog suggested.  I took half of that batter and separated that into four little bowls and added food coloring until I got the color I wanted.  (I used a lot to get brighter, richer colors.)  My step mom had bought me a cake pop pan and was especially grateful that day to have it.   Each color made about  four balls each and I baked them for about 20 minutes.

Colorful Cake balls!

  After that, I prepared the other cake mix.  So now I have one and a half cake mixes prepared.  I put a thin layer of mix on the bottom of the pan, placed some cake balls randomly in the pans and then covered them up as much as I could.  Now in the original blog, she used 3 six inch round pans.  Well, Target only had nine inch pans when I was shopping last minute so that is what I used.  When they first came out of the oven they seemed too skinny.  That is when I started second guessing myself and thought this grandiose idea was going to back fire on me.  I was kind of sweating while waiting for them to cool thinking it was just going to come out awful.  But seriously,there is nothing a little (or a lot) of icing can't fix.  I just layered it thick to fill in the spaces and it came out a little lopsided but not too bad.  Hooray!

Okay, so it didn't look too bad from the outside.  I just hoped the cuteness had worked on the inside.  Keep your fingers crossed!

Birthday Girl!

Even though we sang and Ombretta blew out candles that night, we just could not eat it after a huge dinner with a surprise brownie sundae for dessert.  But we didn't have to wait long to see if the polka dots came out right.  We decided to have birthday cake for breakfast!  Hooray!  Don't judge, they were on vacation.  When I sliced into it, I was so happy to find out..it worked!

Next time I will definitely use the smaller cake pans and use more cake balls.  But I was so happy it turned out.  It is so fun to do special things for special people.  I think it would be fun to do a vanilla or strawberry cake with chocolate cake balls or the other way around.  Too fun!