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So I thought I had to work tomorrow at the place that I’m going to be externing at, but when I called them today they said they didn’t need me. Since I already took off at Reo’s in anticipation of working that night, I now have the whole weekend off, with nothing planned and no reason to get up at 4:30 am like I usually have to on Saturday mornings. I know I’ll end up getting up early anyways, but at least it’s my own time, I can sit and read and have a cup of tea. I have no idea what we’re going to do this weekend. We were going to work on the yard, but Jon said it’s supposed to rain tomorrow afternoon, so that might not work. Maybe we’ll have some friends over for dinner, but that would mean cleaning the house, so I’m not sure. Today was pretty uneventful…I did make some really kick ass lemon bars at work, but other than that nothing of note happened. I’ll bring my camera if we go anywhere interesting this weekend and put the pics up Sunday night.

I put up some more pics from the wedding cake practical, as well as some other stuff we’ve been working on in class, including cocoa painting on marzipan, which I personally think was a waste of 3 days, but I don’t write the curriculum. Anyways, enjoy them.

So I was on summer break this past week, and it was remarkable only in its unremarkableness. I read, a lot. And that’s pretty much it. My parents live in St. Pete, Fl, so I spent kind of a tense day on Friday hoping that they wouldn’t get hit by the hurricane, but they were lucky and it hooked south of them. Other than that excitement, I can’t say too much of note happened. I did drive up to Mt. Hood with my neighbor and her family, and that was kind of cool, but it’s hard to get a lot of exploring in when you have a restless one-year-old with you. It was fun though. This weekend we did almost nothing, other than some shopping and video game playing. I’m not a big video game player (I lack the hand-eye coordination; I spent most of my childhood with my nose in a book and didn’t play any video games ’til I moved in with Jon) so I usually just help Jon solve the puzzles, look up hints on the Web, etc. I’m trying to play Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, but we’ll see how far I get before giving up in frustration. Jon’s playing Luigi’s Mansion, and it’s kinda cool. The graphics are pretty good and it’s not too long or difficult, perfect for playing over a weekend.

Not much on the agenda for the week, just school and work. I have some pics to put up but I don’t know when I’ll get around to it.

So the wedding cake is coming together pretty well. I spent part of today attaching about 400 little tiny white gumpaste flowers to the cake with royal icing. And then, when all that fun was finished, I had to make about 400 little teeny tiny green dots with royal icing in the centers of the aforementioned white gumpaste flowers. Not the most amazingly exciting morning, but the cake is really starting to look cool. I have a pale green and white kinda theme going, it’s very spring-y looking. Some of the other cakes in the class are looking really beautiful as well. I took some pictures today and I’m going to take some more tomorrow and post them all at once tomorrow night. The only things I have left to make are a rose, two more chrysanthemums, and some ivy to go on the top of the cake. I had enough chrysanthemums, but I wasn’t really happy with how one of them turned out, and some petals broke off of the other one. At least I’m getting lots of practice. I saved the rose for last since I think it’s going to be the biggest pain to make, and I wanted to get everything else out of the way first. But alas, it’s coming down to the wire and I really should stop procrastinating and just make it.

In other baking related news, I’ve been messing around with making different kinds of cheesecake at work, since it seems to be a big seller. On Saturday, I made Caramel Pecan cheesecake and it was a big hit. I made 3 more yesterday and most of it was gone when I went to pick up my check tonight. The only thing that I keep having issues with is my lemon bar recipe. It’s too squishy, and when I add more eggs it tastes too eggy. Tomorrow I’m going to ask the chef that bakes for the school bakery (Cafe Bleu) for his recipe, since the lemon bars there are super yummy. I also made 160 brownies for a party on Monday night. It’s hard to bake large quantities in the kitchen there, since it’s not really set up for baking. It’s ok though, I figure it’s good experience to work in different kinds of kitchens and get used to working in less than ideal conditions. I guess I’m just spoiled since the kitchens at school are so damn nice.

Not a whole lot else going on…I should be in bed but since I didn’t have to work tonight I took a nap and now I’m not sleepy. I’ll be kicking myself in the morning, but for now I’m going to try and be productive and get some laundry done.

So being from Wisconsin, where the growing season is like 5 minutes long, I’m still amazed at the incredible produce that grows in Oregon. A couple of weekends ago, Heather (my friend and neighbor) and I went blueberry picking, and this weekend we went and picked peaches. We picked like 30 lbs and it only cost about $15, which is pretty good. There’s nothing like biting into a perfectly ripe peach that you’ve picked yourself and that’s still warm from the sun. When we got back, I made peach cobbler to have for dessert, and it was so good. Now I’m full of peachy goodness and ready to roll into bed.

This is our second week of wedding cakes in school, and I’m really enjoying it. It’s interesting to see some of the cakes that the other people in the class are working on. All of our ideas are really different despite having a pretty specific set of requirements. I wasn’t too sure about mine at first, I thought it was kind of boring, pretty much like every other wedding cake. But the more I work on it, the more I like how it’s turning out. We’re supposed to have them done by Friday, so hopefully I’ll have some pics up by Sunday or so. One of the requirements for the cake is 3 large gumpaste flowers. Gumpaste, for those of you who don’t know, is kind of like clay made from sugar, with some other stuff added to make it flexible and easy to work with. It’s really fun to play around with. We got a set of special tools and cutters to use with it and the flowers you can make look really realistic. So far I’ve made chrysanthemums and lilies, and tomorrow I’m going to make roses and some ivy.

I probably won’t write again until next weekend, but if I get any pics taken sooner I’ll post them. I hope everyone has a good week

So I’ve been really busy between work and school, and not much else has been going on. We did go to the beach last Saturday since it was like 104 degrees in the city. The coast was really crowded but it was worth it to not have to deal with the heat.

This weekend we haven’t done anything really. I worked all day yesterday and we just hung out when I got home. I’m not sure about today. We’ll see when Jon wakes up.