My last post was january 13th. eek! I stopped posting then so I could start working on my cakes for the cake show and had planned on casually posting personal updates between now and then. However, 1st trimester tiredness followed by both girls being sick with strep and the flu, then followed by them giving me the flu, prevented all of this from happening. So... Here I am! Back from Austin and the Sugar Arts Cake show. Life can finally get back to normal if I even know what that means. The last week before the show was crazy! I was up until wee hours of the morning every night working on the cakes. Every cake at the show gets a critique sheet afterwards with things that the judges like or what they would have liked you to have done better. The last cake had a critique sheet that mentioned several times that I needed more detail. The bad thing was that I didn't have any time to do anymore detail! I was up until 3 am thursday night working on then worked on it all day friday up until the second we left for Austin. Hopefully if I am able to go next year with a 5 month old, then I will not have the flu the week before and will have more time to get things done!

So today I'm just going to post a ton of pictures! First I'll show you my cakes that I took to the show.

This is the Peacock wedding cake. I did not place with this one and the critique sheet said that my fondant feathers were too thick, I totally agree. The judges also like to see decorations all around the cake for wedding cakes. I personally don't like that look so I do what I'm happy with. I love this cake except for the fat feathers.

This is the Yellow Rose of Texas Cake. I placed second in the adult intermediate division. The bandanna is hand piped and the plaque on top is hand painted. I really enjoyed this cake. All the fondant is hand painted as well. I need an airbrush!

These are my Ruby Red Slippers. You can't see it but they have individual sequins made from fondant covering the entire cake. This is the cake that the judges wanted to see more detail on. They wanted me to shade the bricks on the yellow brick road and add textural grass. This is the only cake that I really feel like it should have won but didn't. Each shoe took 6 hours to place the sequins on. Oh well, I tried my hardest.

Apparently I forgot to take a picture of my last entry. I'll try to get that up in a day or so.

Now I'll show you some pictures from the show. I did not do these cakes and I do not have the names of the people that did. Again, the following cakes are not my work. This pig was in my category with the shoes. It didn't win either but it should have!

This dog won the category that the Ruby Red Slippers were in.

This was a beautiful cake that didn't win anything but it should have! The fishes were all hand painted! This was one of my favorites.

Done by Ruth Rickey, one of my cake heroes. She place either second or third with this in the masters division.
Placed first in adult advanced

This cake placed but I don't remember what place or what division. It is one of my favorites from the show.

The rat cake above is one of my favorites! It is so cute and has so much detail.

The goose only won second place in adult advanced sculpted cake. It was amazing!

The Geisha won first in Adult Inter. special techniques. It was beautiful and the kimono was hand painted. This horrible picture does not do it justice!

This horse head won First in Adult Masters Sculpted cake and also Best of Show! That means she got a huge silver punch bowl and some cash. It was amazing with such detail! Definitely deserved that honor! Below is the silver platters that went to the Best of the Division and Show cake winners. Next year I plan on bringing a few of these home.