Dar ing bakers challenge!

This month the challenge was a party cake by Dorie :)
I did a small variation on the layer cake requirement. I made a mini layer cake. I made cupcakes, sliced and stacked them to make an itty-bitty layer cake. It was ok, but I put way too much alcohol in the frosting. I'll explain later. :)

:update time!: So, the issue with 'too much alcohol' was I made the frosting out of confectioner's sugar, cocoa and alcohol. It was barely spreadable, so I added 'just a little more' alcohol. It was definitely spreadable. Instead of just adding more sugar to it I went ahead and poured it over my cake. The taste was great, but those fumes were amazing. It was like chewing a shot. Just a little overpowering, to say the least. Good thing it was such a small cupcake! I ate the rest of the cupcakes for breakfast with a little butter; they were delicious.

Apron Swap

I'm going to start putting up my backlog of posts; maybe I should post without the pictures from now on? We'll see.


Anyhow, for my very first Swap-Bot swap I joined the Flirty Apron Swap. It was a lot of fun, actually, and I got to try out some new stitch functions on my machine. :) My partner was Heather, and since she seemed to enjoy retro styling I got to choose between some vintage-reprint fabrics I had culled from the remnants bin at Hart's. I settled on this kitchy print for the pockets and front waistband. For the main fabric I used a pretty swirly yellow, and then I decided to back it with blue, to make it a little more 'protective' of clothing. I'm afraid it may be too heavy. Anyhow, did some edging with red, added a 'flirty' ruffle and sent it off. I hope it's flirty. C said "hubba hubba" when I tried it on, but who knows. ;)

Finger Puppet Swap

This one was fun! My partner said she liked bat wings, but not pastels, and has a toddler girl, so I hope they like these!

I took a sock of mine (I don't want to say 'old sock' because that sounds worn-out and grimy; this was a 'formerly worn' sock.) and sewed the basic shapes out of one top, using the original cuff for the bottoms.

I left enough room for fingers and then sewed them off to be fat little bean-like monsters.

One of them I embroidered little horns on the back of the head; they look a bit like eyes though. :)

I really love them; I think I may make more, and they can keep K's monsters company.

six months old