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Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Things I like

two fold post
one fold: I reaslized I don't need to blog huge amounts of info when I blog, its ok to just post a quickie


two fold: I really like these little shrines, I find them very inspirational, and I want to make some
this is a Guardian Angel Box by SilverSunbeam


another two fold: Here is another loverly. wire wrapping and peridot colroed pearls, how can it go wrong? This tree is located at starsb117's etsy shop

Thursday, June 12, 2008

Mom says TV is a bad influence....


Zs tree cake front
Originally uploaded by Zoeowyn
How can TV be bad for me???
This is my soon to be 8 year olds cake. its a jungle tree. It is 7 "layers" of cake plus fondant tall. its all edible except for the leaves and inner supports. The bark is chocolate fondant and modeling chocolate. the mushrooms are those little melting candies and fondant.
The mantra for the 2 days it took to bake and decorate this puppy was "What Would Duff Do?"
WWDD
Yes I love Ace of Cakes
No I dont bake, thank the gods I have my friend Sarah. She actually said her job is to make it taste good mine it to make it look good. This is our second cake creation together. The first one was he son's lego cake.
We are planning what the next step in our growth cake wise is--recipes and piping and royal icing practice!

Thursday, June 5, 2008

Sugar Skulls



Today was my last day for the annual cultural teachers training camp.
Last year I taught just cane dancing. This year I was way so happy to be asked to teach some visual art classes in addition to the belly dancing.
The teachers who take this training camp are all wide open and receptive to other cultures (ok one of the reasons they come). I wish more area teachers would come
I know the director would like for more teachers to come.
Its fun, its wonderful, its a load of in-service credits, something teachers really need!
This week I taught bark painting, and henna, and andikra cloth decorating.
Today’s class was decorating the sugar skulls. I used plaster in the molds, and they turned out so great.
One of the other dance instructors came in and she is Mexican. So she was telling us how her grandmother would make sugar skulls, and how they would go have a picnic at the grave sites. It was great. I felt a bit like a fraud (this was all me—she didn’t once do anything to make me feel that way). Here’s this woman who grew up in this culture taking my class, and I’m teaching it because I LOVE making decorated skulls, and I love the whole concept of honoring people from our past.
All the teachers had fun with today’s class. I think they had more fun with today’s class than any of the other ones because it taxed their artistic skills the least.