The Sky is Falling!

The first thing I noticed when I opened the door this morning, was the sound of dozens of birds singing, it was such a surprising sound! It had snowed all night and as I walked out of my door, the whole world seemed to be still and silent, except for this extraordinary bird song. I couldn't believe how many birds were about, black birds, robins, blue tits, chaffinches, jays, magpies, pigeons and others I couldn't get close enough to to identify. So I got my camera out and started shooting. These are a few of my favourite shots:

A Bit of Snow Fun

I  just wanted to share some of the fun we have been having in the snow.

Our little Westie, just loves the snow! She barks at it as it is falling and rolls in it and bounces around and charges through snow drifts, and at the end of the day she is so coated in snow balls she can barely walk.

A friend of mine said that she looked like a little snowman in this photo, so I gave her a hat and scarf. 

Sledding, of course, is mandatory!

Can you spot the dog?

As is snowman building (using my Just Add Snow Kit).

We made giant ice marbles

and looked at giant icicles.

"Now I am the master!" [Darth Vader Cake]

I was asked to make a cake for a young man who is a fan of Star Wars. I started picturing light sabres and Death Stars, but since his favourite character was Darth Vader, I asked whether he would like his cake to look like Darth Vader's mask. For the first week after it was decided that this was what I would do, I was excited about the challenge. Then I started thinking about how I was actually going to make the cake, every second day I came up with a whole new plan. I looked on the internet to see what other people had done, but strangely, there don't seem to be very many life-sized Darth Vader head cakes out there. By the time I actually started making the cake, I was winging it, making it up as I went along. Half way through, disaster struck and I practically had to start from scratch (except for the baking). The day before it was due, I was having visions of calling my client up and telling them that there would be no cake! Somehow, I figured it out and it all came together. I was going to say that I will never tackle a cake like this again, but then I realised that I now know how to tackle a cake like this. So bring it on!

For those of you with a dislike of black icing, I'm with you there! There is no black icing on this cake. It was all sculpted with white fondant, and then sprayed black. I find that this tastes a whole bunch better, and reduces staining of mouths tremendously. The cake is dark chocolate sponge with vanilla buttercream icing. And just so that you can see just how big it is, here is my daughter with it.