Handcrafted Happiness: So into the Sunshine....

It's been forever since I posted because I am just too into the California sunshine! It's pretty stinkin hard to motivate yourself to sit at a computer when there are glorious adventures to be had in California - 85 degrees, warm, sunny, the ocean, bikes, farmers markets, food, beer, great friends...its just all too exciting. But! Since I've been so bad at it recently, here's a few pictures from the past month...

Shooting at the range with my best guy friends...So scary and so fun! Like the biggest adrenaline rush...

Marzipan fruits in a Nougatine basket. Most everyone used the airbrush machine, but I thought the colors were much too harsh, and didn't have enough brown undertones, so I had painted everything...And in the middle there's a bike with a basket full of flowers. I kept trying to make all my fruits and vegetables look like Farmers' Market produce - everything is a little krunky and crooked, but I think it worked out nicely. But! Since my most favorite thing in the whole world is to ride my bike to the farmer's market, and we had to make a figurine of our choosing, I made a little bike, with a basket full of flowers and ferns.

I am particularly into the pear...

And I really love the carrots!

And I love the apple!

We picked up some strawberry shortcake cookies from a great little bakery in Santa Cruz after going to the beach! They were a lot like scones, but full of fresh strawberries, and sprinkled with sugar on top.

Beach in Santa Cruz.

A Warm Apple Charlotte with Green Apple Sorbet, and Caramel Apple Sauce. So, so delicious.

A Hazelnut Praline and Kiwi dessert with Kiwi Frozen Yogurt....interesting, but not that delicious. But the little cookies are so cute! And were really fun to make.

Chocolate Ganache Tart with Coconut Ice Cream, Coconut Creme Anglaise and Chocolate Sauce, and Coconut Shavings. So, so good.

Our first big chocolate project - We had to create an 8" high Candy Stand, filled with homemade Chocolate Candies. We based our projects on Tim Burton movies, so I chose to base mine off of "Big Fish", which is my favorite of all his movies.

If you've seen the movie, one of the major points is the "big fish in a small pond", and that "if you want to catch a big fish, you have to give it something valuable..." hence, the gold ring, hanging on the fish hook out of the mouth.

A shot of the "rippled" water.

Creme Brulee - classic.

Chocolate Boxes...

This is mine, the "Truffles A L'Orange....we had to put the bow onto the box, which I wasn't that into, but tried to go for a very parisian feel....sort of vaudeville.

This was my midterm project - we were each assigned a cake, and a finishing technique (like buttercream, or fondant, or marzipan) and I got Lemon Cake with Buttercream and Fruit Mousse. Here's a sketch of my drawing - it had to be for an occasion, so I chose to make an anniversary cake, based on the poem "i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)." by e.e. cummings.