My Cake Blog

Hey Everyone, be sure to check out my new cake blog and become a follower! There are a lot more cakes to come!

http://simplycakesbymandy.blogspot.com/

Cupcake Wars!

My friend Shae has a cupcake business and asked me to be her assistant on Cupcake Wars. She had auditioned for the show with her business partner, but by the time they heard back from Cupcake Wars her business partner was moving and didn't want to do it anymore. So Shae asked me to do it with her and of course I said yes! Who doesn't want to be on the Food Network? So a week and a half after we found out we were going to be on it, we were on our way to LA. It was so much work! I can't tell you exactly all that we had to do to prepare for it because that would give away all the secrets of reality TV and I am sworn to secrecy, but I will just say that I learned first hand that reality TV is NOT reality. They make things look so different than they really are. Anyway, we didn't win but it was a great experience for me, and a fun little adventure for Shae and me. If you haven't watched it, it's the Professional Bull Riding episode of season 4. I tried to find it online so I could post a link for it, but couldn't find it, so if you want to see us be famous you'll have to find it on your own (or come over to my house, we have it recorded). :)

Meet Russell

I have been wanting a dog for soooo long! I've been begging Matt for a puppy ever since we got married and I guess he finally caved. All I wanted for Christmas was a puppy. I even told Matt it could be my Christmas, birthday, and graduation present all combined into one. That's all I wanted! But he kept telling me that we had to wait until we bought our own house so we could have a bigger yard etc. etc. Excuse after excuse. So I was NOT expecting to get a puppy for Christmas at all! There was a big box sitting under the Christmas tree and Matt kept telling me he was so excited for me to open it. I honestly wasn't that excited because I knew there was no way there was a puppy inside the box. So Christmas morning came and Matt had me open that box very last. Inside was a dog collar and a picture of Matt holding my puppy. Yes, I cried. I was so happy!

He was at Matt's parent's house, and I couldn't wait to go get him so we hurried and got ready, went to church with my parent's (because there's was at 9:00 and our's wasn't until 11:00 and I couldn't wait that long) then went and picked up my cute little puppy. He is a Beagle and we named him Russell. He has been so much fun and a lot more work than I expected! He got sick a couple of times and the vet even told us that we would have to either spend thousands of dollars on him or put him down... but we nursed him back to health on our own and realized that that certain vet was just a money digger who we won't be going back to ever again. Anyway, I'm a little baby hungry and Russell is my baby for now so I spoil him, probably a little too much. But as you can see he is super cute and how could anyone not spoil him? We love our little Russell :)

Cakes

I have this dream of one day having my own cake business. I took a couple classes to learn the very basics and it is so fun! Besides the cakes I made for those classes, so far I have just made a couple cakes for family. The first one I made was for my sister's 30th birthday. Her birthday fell on Thanksgiving so I made a turkey holding a birthday cake. It is my first real experiment with fondant/gumpaste. It took me awhile to figure out how to make it work just how I wanted it, but I like how it turned out. Then I made a Christmas cake for Matt's grandpa. It was just a DIY cake I found on a cake blog so it was pretty simple but so fun and I think it's pretty cute!

Quick Update...

I haven't been very good at keeping up with this blog since we came back from Pennsylvania, so I'll just give you all a quick update of our lives... Matt got a job selling insurance back in October and seems to be enjoying it. I finished school in December (yay, finally!). I've been looking for jobs since then and hanging out with our new puppy, Russell (I will do a separate post about him because he's so stinkin' cute). Anyway, I was looking for a full-time job as a receptionist or just something that would keep me busy during the day, but after awhile I decided anything would be better than nothing. So I applied for a part-time housekeeping job at a nursing home and what do you know, I got the job. I know it's not the most glamorous job ever, but I'm pretty excited about it because it'll at least give me something to do for a few hours a day and a little extra cash for us :). I've also been working on starting up my cake business. So far I haven't been able to do a whole lot with it, but now that I have a job I will hopefully be able to get some more supplies that I need, start on a portfolio, and find some brides to do wedding cakes for. Hint, if anyone knows someone getting married in southern utah ;)

Goodbye PA

Today is my last day in PA... It is a very bittersweet thing for me because I'm so excited to go back to Utah and see my family and start school again, but I'm so sad to leave Matt and be away from him for two weeks. That is such a long time! Anyway, it has been a good experience for us, and we have learned a lot from it. Being here has made us realize how much we really love living in Utah, being close to our family and friends. It has been a great adventure for us though, and I'm just excited to see what our next adventure will be!

Pioneer Day

We decided we needed to take a little trip to the D.C. temple on Saturday night, so we drove down there only to find that the temple was closed! I was SO SO SAD! I guess it is a lesson to always check if it's open before you actually go... Anyway, the visitor's center was open so we went inside and found out that a Pioneer Program was going on at just the time we were there. It was a bunch of people and kids singing and dancing and playing instruments, dressed up as pioneers. It was pretty cute, especially the little kids playing their fiddles, so our trip to D.C. wasn't completely wasted. Plus, we got to celebrate Pioneer Day on the east coast! We also had to take a little detour on the way home to stop at the Cheesecake Factory for a little dessert. It was a fun night for us, started out a little depressing but ended up being pretty great!