In my standing tradition of fair cakes, I recreated a piece of art on a cake. This year’s masterpiece was inspired by one of Claude Monet’s water lily paintings. I had a fun time playing around with new techniques to decorate the cake, from hand painting to piping buttercream, even some fondant work. 

​Update:  I got first place!

Its fair time again and that means another fabulous fair cake! Like last years cake, I wanted to do a fondant cake and not another buttercream cake. I also didn't want to do something that I would be asked to do for someone else. I try to take this time to do a cake I really would want to do for myself, after all, no one is going to eat it and it's going to sit in a case for two weeks. The cake design was inspired by the wall art I created for my office last year. I started by covering the Styrofoam cakes in white fondant and used a world map print out to trace the shapes of the continents. I used vodka and different shades of blue food coloring and brushed on the bottom layer to create the shades of the oceans. I also did this to create the look of wood on the cake board using shades of brown. To create the golden continents I used vodka and gold food coloring and powder and carefully brushed in the lines. I finished the map by adding a few pops of edible gold leaf for a touch of elegance. For the top tier, I kept it simple and just added ribbons of gold fondant and a few white royal icing roses that also had a touch of gold to them. It was fun to play around with a new technique and I could not have hoped for this cake to turn out any better!

This was another apron that I have wanted to do for years and knew it was time to make it so I could enter it into the fair. I saw a similar apron at Pier-1 years ago and thought it was cute, but it I knew I could make it cuter! I decided since my favorite holiday is just around the corner that it was time to pull the fabric out of the project bin to complete. The bodice was created the same way as the Fourth of July Apron, but instead of a sweetheart neck I wanted more square. After pinning and sewing the orange ribbon in place between the bodice pieces I sewed on the web fabric belt and started working on the skirt. The skirt layers were created with a ½ a yard of each print being cut into ½ a circle. Next I used a triangle I cut out of a piece of paper to cut out the fabric. I didn’t want the triangles to directly lay on each other so it took a little maneuvering, but finally got it perfect. To be completely honest the skirt was that hardest part of this apron. It took a long time to sew all of triangles for each layer. Once all of the skirt layers were sewn, I pinned them to the belt, layering each section over another and sewed in place. The last step was to sew on the ribbon for the neck and ties. The apron was a long time in the making the finished project didn’t disappoint; it even got Honorable Mention at the fair. I can’t wait to wear it for Halloween!

Its Fair time again and that means the decorated cake contest. The last two years I did an adaptation of art, this year I decided to test my fondant skills. 

I love to bake and when I don't have time to bake from scratch nothing beats adding to a pre-made box mix. One of the baked good categories for the fair is just that, this year I decided to do an easy mocha cake, here is the recipe.

Ingredients
      One box French Vanilla cake
      3 eggs
      1/2 cup oil
      1 cup extra strong coffee

Instructions
    Preheat the oven to 375
    Mix all the ingredients together
    Pour into two 8" greased and floured pans
    Bake 30-35 minutes

To make the frosting mix 1 stick of butter, 1/2 cup of crisco, one pound of powdered sugar, 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla and 3 tablespoons of cooled strong coffee. Blend until smoothed and fill and spread over the cooled cake.

Super easy, super tasty and won me 3rd place in best cakes!

The other day I showed off my cake fair entry from this year and I'm really excited that I got best in division again this year! Since I brought up my Starry Night Cake in that post I thought it was only fair that I took the time to share the process and what it looked like. The hardest part of this cake was the amount of time it took. I followed the same process as I did on this years cake, I would pipe buttercream and then brush and blend it with a paint brush. I started with the cypress tree since that was going to be my measuring guide for the other details. I used a dark chocolate buttercream and piped thin black lines as in the original picture. I knew the original also had a lot of texture due to the think layers of oil paint so I replicate that feature with the buttercream. After the tree was completed, I followed the same process for the houses and mountains. For the stars and moon I used several shades of yellow and white buttercream and blended it accordingly. Lastly the sky was used with lots of shades of blue and I carefully created the swirl in the trying to mimic the same brush strokes as Van Gogh used. The sky was really the hardest part because it took the longest and the most blending!  When I was finished I even sent a picture to my former Modern Arts Professor who got a total kick out it!     from        fro 

I love entering things into the Fair. I feel like it is a fun way to show off my creativeness. In the past I have entered quilts, aprons, photos, baked cakes and over the last two years I have entered decorated cakes. Last year I did a cake version of the Vincent Van Gogh Starry Night painting.  This year I didn't want to do another painting so I decided to do my version of a Tiffany Stain Glass Window. I found a stained glass window I liked online and blew up the picture. I hand drew the image on the Styrofoam cake; it's always best to do a fair entry cake on Styrofoam since it will sit in a warm display case during the fair and it  will melt very quickly. Once the image was sketched out I piped the lines using black royal icing. Over the next 12 hours I piped and brushed the remaining buttercream onto the cake, and blended the colors to give the look of stained glass. I didn't intend on staying up all night watching my favorite disasters movies (Independence Day, Twister (watched twice), The Day After Tomorrow, and  Jurassic Park (watched one and  a half times) and working on the cake, but I just got into working on it that I didn't want to stop. I love when something in my head comes out so beautiful....can't wait to see how I did in the fair!!!

Update:  I got Best in Division Advanced Cakes!!!

Amber has a great passion for her photography hobby. She loves to take pictures and later play with editing styles. I think she is an amazing photographer and I love sharing her beautiful photos with everyone here on Oak Tree Lane. This year she took a huge leap to share them with everyone else by entering three of her incredible photographs at the County Fair. I hope everyone is inspired by them as I am.

This quilt was a year and a half in the making. In March of last year, my cousins asked me if I would be willing to sew her a wedding guest book quilt. I happily agreed and we went out to buy the fabric we needed. I cut out all the fabric in 5" x 5" squares and for the signatures I suggest using a none print fabric with a permanent fabric marker. The wedding came and went and a year later we realize that we never finished working on the quilt. During my birthday party in June, we started talking about it again and I asked if she would care if I entered it into the fair. She agreed and I now knew I had a deadline! In August we finally got together and planned the layout of the quilt and picked out the pictures she wanted to add to the quilt. I used a direct print on cotton fabric product that I purchased at Joann's for the pictures since I knew I didn't want to use a print and iron on product. I've used them in the past but I find them to me more work. With the direct print fabric I was able to center the picture in a Word document, printed it, then cut the fabric to the size square I wanted. It took about a week to sew everything together and that was working on it only a few hours a night. I love how the fun fabrics work so well together, and hopefully so will the fair judges!  

Update: I received Second Place in the Memory Quilt Division!!