First of all, Saturday was my sister's birthday....Happy Belated Birthday Leigh! This is her last official birthday (or so she says because she is now 29 years old). We went to Marina's for supper and then back to Dad's house for strawberry cake with cream cheese icing and ice cream...yummy. I made her a very basic but cute purse cake, which she seemed to like very much. Next year, she's getting a 3-D high heel shoe (I can't wait to make that one)!
On Saturday morning, I attended a cake show hosted by Sweet Wise in Nashville. It was an absolutely amazing day! The show featured 2 Saturday sessions with Michelle Bommarito who has participated in 8 cake challenges hosted by the Food Network. She was so down to earth and the sessions were very informal with lots of questions from the audience. I learned so much from her! She was just absolutely amazing! Also featured was Clint Redwine, a DJ from our local 92.9 FM station. He demonstrated how to make a guitar cake. He was hilarious but very informative as well. I also learned how to make sugar beer bottles from another speaker. I don't drink beer and won't be making this cake but the technique was very good and can be adapted for other ideas, so that was a pretty good session as well. Here are some pictures from the day along with some of the cakes by various individuals that were entered in the show:
On Saturday morning, I attended a cake show hosted by Sweet Wise in Nashville. It was an absolutely amazing day! The show featured 2 Saturday sessions with Michelle Bommarito who has participated in 8 cake challenges hosted by the Food Network. She was so down to earth and the sessions were very informal with lots of questions from the audience. I learned so much from her! She was just absolutely amazing! Also featured was Clint Redwine, a DJ from our local 92.9 FM station. He demonstrated how to make a guitar cake. He was hilarious but very informative as well. I also learned how to make sugar beer bottles from another speaker. I don't drink beer and won't be making this cake but the technique was very good and can be adapted for other ideas, so that was a pretty good session as well. Here are some pictures from the day along with some of the cakes by various individuals that were entered in the show:
I will tell you that the morning started with my crying all the way to Nashville. I was having a tough time dealing with Mom's death. Basically, since Mom started feeling rotten in September, I haven't done much at all on the weekends outside of laundry and grocery shopping. On the weekends, Mom and I would generally go shopping or at least window shopping. It is so lonely without her. Leigh does her own thing generally, and Jason and Dad don't really share the same interests as me, so that just leaves me and Ash together. All the way to Nashville, I kept thinking that if Mom were still alive and healthy, she would be in the seat next to me cheering me on in my cake creations. She would have been bored with a lot of the sessions but she would have gone with me without a doubt. When I arrived, I struggled even more because all around me were moms and daughters...I had to get up and go clear my mind so that I could focus (not to mention see through the tears). I thought about how Mom must have felt years ago when our family initially moved from Georgia and Mom didn't have her mother around on the weekends. She would load us up and off we would go together...I will pick up and do the same with my children. Those days and adventures led to a wonderful relationship and friendship with my Mom. It's hard but with God's help, I'll take each day as it comes and will make it through until either I join her in eternity or Christ returns. I can't tell you how many times a day that I pray that today will be the day when Christ comes again.
On Sunday, we awoke to almost 7 inches of snow! We were expecting a mere dusting but were pleasantly surprised. For TN, this is a lot of snow, and was by far the most snow that Ashton has ever seen. We did go out and play for a very short period of time (I'm still trying to get over bronchitis and Ashton is just getting over strep). The snow wasn't very wet, so it didn't stick together well but Ashton loved making his first snow angels. Here are some pics of our day:
