Quilted two sided drunk barbie cake

Hello lovelies,

This entry is my version of a drunk barbie cake. I searched and searched for one to emulate and I couldn't find one quite "classy" enough- some people had great ideas like here & here but I didn't know where to search for "mini's" of things and I didn't want the whole cake to look like a drunk mess just in case the birthday girls' parents decided to pop by- this was their little girl still after all.

So, when my friend and fellow cake builder showed me a gorgeous picture of a quilted black and pink cake, I had an idea- what if the front side of the cake looked all pretty and classy, and the back side had a passed out puking (sprinkles) barbie? That way, from the front, it was completely G rated and from the back, the PG started!

Well, the original plan was to make fondant which I've done more than a few times for some more R rated bachelorette cakes (tutorial soon!) so I was completely comfortable with that (find that recipe here). However, you need Time for fondant, and, seeing as how we didn't even bake the cake until late the night before, we didn't have time. So instead, I bought some pre-made icing and we just mixed our food color gel directly into the can. I got most of my baking supplies at Bulk Barn for a great deal!

So, since the birthday girl doesn't like chocolate (I was just as shocked as you are), I found a recipe to make a dense cake that could withstand toppings that was white. I didn't particularly like the taste of the recipe, however, it was great for its cause. I would prefer to use chocolate if I did this again just because I find the shape holds up so dang well.

So, we ended up mixing a hot pink and a black batch of icing. I made a 9" and a 6" cake and iced them separately before stacking them, then my friend fixed up the icing (aka made it smooth and beautiful) and we went on to decorating.

First, my friend stuck the barbie in the back of the cake (we deemed the back by finding the place on the cake with the most flaws lol). She stuck a whole hand in there so she wouldn't slip off the cake. To prep the barbie, we had teased her hair all messy and rubbed mascara below her eyes and removed a shoe.

For the sides of the cake, we wanted to make that coach bag stitched look with "diamonds" at the cross points but I couldn't find a Single tutorial on how to make this in icing- there are plenty for fondant even with some sheets that you just press onto the cake- so little to no work at all! But nothing for icing and especially nothing small enough for our cake (since it was quite mini).
So we did what all great cake procrastinators do- we made it up!
I had just bought a 3 pack of rulers from the dollar store to make my diamond pinata, and had a clean one left over that i washed and then just eyeballed it to make diagonal lines across the cake. It was too easy. I just had to make sure to wipe the ruler after each time or else it would just smear the icing.
My friend followed behind and put little silver coke balls at each cross point. If you wanted this more precise, you could definitely space it out and make a mark every 2cm or 1/2 inch or so and then connect the dots. But I wanted something quicker and I have a pretty decent eye for these things.

Then we simply placed the "21" candle and the store bought roses in a pleasing manner. And we sprinkled hot pink sprinkles all over the top of the cake on each layer. Then, for the "puke," we placed pink coke balls and sprinkles in a pile near barbies mouth. My friend then wrote the birthday girls' name on the board very pretty and we were done.

Make sure to check out the finished cake pictures below and see the end of this post for a quick step by step- make sure to follow my boards on Pinterest to keep updated to my posts and post your own photos if you try this out!

So, here's a shortened how to:
1. Bake a 6 + a 9" cake from a sturdy recipe.
2. Mix your favorite food colorings straight into the store bought canned icing can.
3. Let cakes cool (or do it the lazy (crazy?) girls' way and stick the cakes into your bbq to cool in the middle of winter).
4. Ice cakes separately and then stack them directly onto your finished surface (I just used a store bought for mine).
5. Mess up your barbie- aka make her makeup run down her face and tease her hair then stick her into the cake (or place her gently, up to you.
6. Decorate!
You're done- easy as pie err cake, non? Have fun with it! I am proof that you don't need to have much time or know what you're doing and can still create a pretty awesome cake.

Diamond origami/ pinata

Soo, last week I was helping to plan a 21st birthday party for my best friends' little sister. Between my friend, the little sisters best friend and me, we decided to do a pink and diamond themed party. Within minutes, I was on Pinterest looking for ideas- I searched "diamond pinata" and was brought up to a link that showed a pinata I could buy online for the "low" price of $140. Uhmm, I'm not so keen on that.

Being the "I can do anything myself" type, I decided to do it myself! (big surprise there). So, I started another search, this time on youtube looking for a diamond template. I quickly found an adorable girl with a great tutorial, an awesome link and saved this links picture to a camera memory card and went to my local Staples to get it printed (but bigger). I explained to them what I wanted and they flat out told me I couldn't do it. Didn't make other suggestions, didn't really even listen to what other options I may be okay with- the girl just said no and that was that.
Soo, not easily deterred, I went to Kopi Ko- a locally owned (possibly a chain? I'm not positive) store that told me that while, no, they couldn't print it on the poster board I already had but that yes, they could enlarge it and I could just glue the paper they'd print it on to my poster board. So a few trial and errors later, I had my blown up version of the original diamond template.

I took this paper home and used just cheap white glue from the dollar store and a foam brush to paint a thin layer of glue onto the poster board. Then, stick the white paper to the poster board, smoothing out any bumps with the edge of a plastic ruler on a 45 degree angle (be careful while doing this because I didn't wait for the glue to dry long enough and ended up creating a minor tear in my paper.
Then I let this dry for about 10 minutes.

Next up, I tried to think of how to score my lines. Seeing as how we were on a tight schedule and budget and I didn't have a scorer, I made up my own way with a pen and a plastic ruler, simply lining my ruler up to the left side of any given line (I'm right handed- if you're left handed, line the ruler up to the right side of any given line), and running my pen back and forth, pressing quite hard, on the line. (Note, do Not do this with your favorite pen- I just used a cheap black pen that was almost out of ink- ink is not necessary for this to work, you just need a pointy but not sharp point [you don't want to cut through the board]. I "scored" all my lines then repeatedly folded them up and re-bent the lines with my thumbnail so they were extra bent.

Next, I followed the directions from the video and folded up each side and glued it to its corresponding partner. This worked great, as I pinched the glued bits and let them dry a bit before moving onto the next side, until the last side. But first, and I forgot this bit (and it was rather annoying to correct after the fact), find the center of your top or the flat part of the pinata and poke a hole there. I like using a pin or sewing needle to poke the initial hole then using a screw or pen/cil to make the hole bigger- this way there is less of a risk of tearing. Take a piece of medium weight rope and knot it at one end. Thread the unknotted end through the hole (inside of the pinata to outside).

Now for the fun part- fill up your pinata!! Since I was making mine for a 21st birthday party, the contents were a little more 18A (I'm from Alberta, Canada so the legal drinking age is 18, but 21 is still a big party.)- condoms, items from the sex store and alcohol filled the pinata but you could use whatever you want to fit your theme from glitter and confetti, to toys and games to makeup to treat bags- whatever your little heart desires! Remember to leave enough room to fit the knotted end of the rope in.
Also, if you don't want to break the pinata and just want to leave it as decor, don't fill it! This is your party and you can choose to fill your pinata only if you want to.

Next, take a needle and thread from the inside (also knotted at one end), and poke it from inside to out through the last joint in the pinata form so you're able to tighten the last joint together (since the shape is now closed, you wont be able to pinch it closed like the others so instead just pull the thread to tighten it and push the seam close. Let this dry overnight and then clip the thread on the last seam.

Now the fun part! Decorating the diamond. I decided not to use a glue/ paper mixture to create layers of a shell on the outside like a traditional pinata because I didn't want to ruin the sharp lines and great shape that I had created with close to a half an hour of scoring so instead, I just did layers of glitter mod podge and silver sparkles built up (for a total of about 3 layers- with the final layer being mod podge to seal all the glitter in.) to create a disco ball effect.
But remember, you can decorate this according to your tastes and your party! For a pink birthday party, make a pink diamond using a coat or two of your daughter, sons or best friends favorite pink paint then covering that with a few layers of glitter mod podge- black, yellow, pink, green, blue- whatever color you use, I'm sure it will look fabulous! If you decide to try this out, please send me your pins or tag me @morganlencucha in your pin.

Soo, the basic steps are:
1. Buy poster board from the dollar store (I chose to use white but any color would work)
2. Follow this link and then the link in the video and save the image to a memory stick/ card.
3. Get template printed out then blown up- to the largest size that you can while still being able to fit the image on a single piece of cardstock.
4. Score all the lines then bend them up in whatever way you deem appropriate.
5. Re-bend all the lines in (you'll start to see the shape appear.) and cut out on the outermost lines (see picture)

6. (I forgot this step, but it's pretty important!) Find the center of the flat part of your diamond, and make a hole. Feed a rope (knotted at one end) through this hole.
If, like me, you forget this step, do what I did- wait for everything to dry at least overnight in a cold place (I used my garage) then take a ruler and mark the center of the diamond. Next take a drill and carefully drill two holes about an inch or 2.5cm apart- bend a piece of medium gauge wire and hook it through these holes. Twist the wire at the top and tada!
6 1/2 (optional)- fill the pinata with goodies or leave it empty to use as decor.
7. Follow the directions from the video, folding up the shape, and attaching the "points" but instead of tape, use glue. Hold each section closed while it dries.
8, "Stitch" last section closed with needle/thread and glue.
9. Let dry overnight.
10. Now the fun part!- paint and decorate! I used a cheap silver paint from Walmart and did one coat of that. Then I let that dry and covered it in one coat of glitter mod podge. I decided not to make an actual pinata with layers of paper but just the idea of one with goodies inside

And basic (estimate) costs/ supply list:
-white card stock (0.50c at my local dollar store)
-getting the template printed large ($2.40)
-memory card or stick (hopefully you have one of these laying around or else they'll be about $10 from Walmart)
-white glue ($1.50 at my dollar store)
-silver paint ($2.25 at Walmart)
-silver glitter ($10 for a giant tub at Micheal's)
-glitter mod podge ($10 for a medium tub at Walmart)
-a length of rope (I actually used metal wire that was laying around the house) (less than $2)
-plastic ruler for scoring (3 for $1 at the dollar store)
-an almost out of ink pen (we all have these laying around so free)
-stuffing materials- this depends on what you want and how much of it you need.

Sooo overall, I'm super happy with how this turned out; the total project cost me under $30 since I had some of the supplies at home which is way cheaper than what I found online and only took me about an hour and half to complete total (not including drying time).
Also, I made it so now I have bragging rights and I saved over $110 opposed to buying it and got to personalize the outside and contents as much as I wanted.
The scoring of the lines was a nuisance but time would be saved with a scoring tool.
Overall I completely recommend this project- if I can do it, so can you! Make sure to send me a link to where you posted you trying this out.

Diamond pinata? Success!! Don't forget to like and share if you enjoyed this post.

That's all for today,
Mo

Welcome to "My Pinterest Life"

Sooo, we all have a teensy tiny thing for (scratch that), obsession with (that too)... Addiction to; Pinterest, right? But how many of us actually try out/do the things we post? Show of hands? Okay, that makes one, slightly hesitant person. So you actually tried one meal that you pinned? Good for you! But come on, what's the point of pinning all these ideas/ recipes/ DIYs/ outfits/ workouts/ quotes/ tattoos/ wedding ideas/ artists/ blogs/ etc etc etc if you never look at them again and never try them out for yourself to see what actually works and what you actually like?

If you're just spending x amount of hours on Pinterest, logging all these great ideas to "go back to" but never actually "go back to" them, than what's the point of making a note of them in the first place?

This blog is going to be filled to the brim of plenty of different "genres" of Pinterest- some of the main ones will include (but wont be limited to); wedding, DIY, workouts and recipes.
Let's take workouts as an example. Once I get into it, I can spend hours pinning all these great workouts and motivational quotes and bodies and on and on and on but do I spend any of that time actually trying to workouts? Noticing how it makes my body feel? Striving for results? No. I just make a huge collection of ideas and never actually do any of them. How pointless is that??
So this blog is to break that habit:

Each post will be reviewing a different pin. And I will update or comment on each pin as I try it so you can keep up to date on my Pinterest as well!

Wish me luck and if you have any suggestions of pins for me to try, just let me know and I will try them!

TTFN,
M

P.S.- Follow me!