So Here We Go.....

Almost a year ago now I, wanting to keep my baby's first birthday party cheep and also terribly un-inspired by most 1st birthday themes, decided 'Hey - I can make her cake - that'll be easy.' So I googled some recipes, bought a piping bag and some icing colors, and tried very hard to remember how my sister, Toma, had decorated the Mickey Mouse cake she had made for her husband's birthday 15 years ago.
With the mixer my husband had bought me for our first Christmas together in hand I set out to mix up some great vanilla cupcakes and butter cream frosting. Everything was going great until the mixer started whining a little....and then a lot....and then in a giant puff of smoke, it died. Just died. I couldn't do anything else with it. Luckily, I was done with everything but coloring the icing so several minutes, and one very tired stirring arm later, I was done - with the prep at least. That's when it hit me: I had no idea what I was doing. With a little less than an hour to spare before party time I managed to turn 23 cupcakes into a decent princess castle.....and so began my journey to, what I hope will be, cake artist stardom.
Several months after the cupcake castle, I took a decorating class with two of my besties, Kimmy and Shasta. I don't think any of us really wanted to be there because we were passionate about decorating cakes - we were just loving the 2 hours of guaranteed girl time every week. We had a great time, but I can't say we really learned a lot. The next class didn't work out because of a scheduling issue (it's very hard to find two hours a week to play Betty Crocker with 4 very busy kids to keep up with.) I'm a big fan of improvising though, and what I can't go to class to learn, I turn to my good friend youtube to learn.
So here we are, 11 months later and I've finally decided what I want to be when I grow up. I'm no Bronwen Weber, and won't ever be, but if this adventure doesn't take me to stardom, we'll all find out together where it will lead. I've made a lot of cakes for a lot of people over the past 8 months or so. Some were good. Some couldn't even play on the same field as bad. But it's been fun. The one thing I regret is not taking a picture of every single cake I've ever made. For some reason I was under the delusion that if it didn't turn out the way I wanted it to, there was no use taking a picture of it. No more of that. We can't all learn from my mistakes if I don't have pictures of my mistakes, so from here on out there will be pics of all of them (the good, the bad, AND the ugly.) Now if I could just figure out how to post the pictures we'd be golden.
So as much as I'd love to spend the next 6 hours here typing up all of my baking adventures, I really have to go.... I have promises to keep, and cakes to make before I sleep.