♥ Blue ✈: October 2012

I've had three people contact me about the Death Star cake pictured in my previous post. I honestly don't have any advice about how to go about it...I just wing it when I make cakes, but I'm happy to share the process I went through.

This was four layers...enough to make two whole cakes. When cooled, I frosted them and stacked them up on top of each other and put it in the refrigerator to firm up. Once chilled, I started cutting it into a sphere shape. When that was done, I put it in the refrigerator to chill some more, while making homemade fondant. It was my 2nd time making fondant...which is ridiculously overpriced and disgusting if you purchase the stuff, but really easy and pretty tasty if you make your own out of marshmallows. I tinted mine dark.

Once the fondant was made, I covered the sphere, used a ball (about the size of a billiards ball) to make the indentation, and then sprayed it with edible silver paint. Then I used a paint brush and edible black paint for the decor. I drew lines all around it, and painted them in. Added a green candy for the laser-thingy, and it was done.

Here are some snapshots of the process, including one with Gator and his cake, and the cake half-eaten. Hope this helps some of you with your Birthday Jedi needs!

(You may be interested in my all-time most popular blog post about hosting a
Star Wars Birthday Party. I get about 50 visits a day to this post.)

Hi all,
It is a sad reality that my blog has become a mostly obsolete thing. Most of the people who I know read my blog are also on Facebook, so they see the photos and the this-N-thats of my daily life. Seems a bit redundant to share the same stuff here. Not that Facebook is anything like what a blog can be, but over time it's become my primary source of online interaction.

Part of this is because something transpired almost five months ago that left my heart kind of shell-shocked. Since then, I haven't really had many other thoughts I could write about. I'm not depressed, just kind of numb, like I'm sort of unable to feel things properly. I'm sure it'll pass someday, but for now, I haven't felt much like sharing what's on my mind. Perhaps someday I will.

Meanwhile, life goes on. Thankfully! Despite my brokey little heart, I've enjoyed doing some fun things. In June, the kids and I spent a wonderful week in NYC and another great week in Vermont. In July I took Bunch on a trip to Hawaii. I'd been planning to take Gator, too, but one day a couple weeks before we were planning to leave, he informed me that he didn't want to go on any more trips that summer. After checking his DNA to verify that he was, indeed, my child, I acquiesced and allowed him to stay home. My worries that he'd change his mind and wish he'd come after we were already gone never transpired, and he enjoyed being a homebody whilst Bunch and I enjoyed visiting the North Shore of Oahu and my sister's family. Those are comparable, no?!

In August, Gator had his 13th birthday, and I made him a fantastic death Star cake. Every year I think "how am I going to top this next year?" and every year I seem to do okay, coming up with something he loves even more than the previous year… But this seriously might be the end of it, because this cake was seriously so awesome.

It wasn't too sad to say goodbye to my sister in Hawaii, because there was a good chance I was going to see her again this month...and I did!

Her husband is from French Polynesia. Every few years they make the trek back to visit his family in Tahiti and Moorea, and had invited me to join them any time they were there. So it was just fortunate that it all worked out perfectly, and I was able to spend five days with them this month.

Tahiti and Moorea are surreal!

The first morning after arriving, my sister and I went out on a standup paddleboard and a canoe with her two kids. We were staying at his parent's home, and the ocean is in their back yard. I had my five year old nephew on my canoe, and she had her daughter on the SUP. We were enjoying the water and the morning when we suddenly saw whale spouts nearby. It was the most incredible thing! A momma humpback and at least one calf (seemed like there must have been two...but if not, that kid got around!) were hanging out in the ocean out behind the house, and we spent a couple hours with them. It was so magical! I was super bummed that we didn't have a camera to capture them jumping into the air, looking at us with their big, beautiful eyes, displaying fins and tails, spouting off. It was otherworldly. There were people on boats nearby taking pictures. I was definitely jealous.

Photo of me and my nephew and one of our whale
friends from the Tahitian newspaper

Then this week something amazing happened: someone on the boat was connected to the local Tahitian newspaper and did an article about whale watching excursions, and they printed a photo with the story of...you guessed it...ME!

My brother-in-law's family saw it and recognized the paddle board and canoe, and sent us the picture. I couldn't believe that my wish for a photo was granted in such an unexpected way!

All in all it was an incredible trip. Too many memories to share, but I'll leave you with just a few more photos of this amazing speck of paradise in the vast Pacific Ocean: