Strawberry Layer Cake

The results of week two of cake decorating class. I like the simplicity of the cake–it’s really cute and girly! There’s vanilla frosting filling, but next time I might try to add fresh fruit to the filling too.

DIY Business Cards

I’ve been wanting to make my own business cards for a while now, and I finally got around to it last night. I’m really happy with how they turned out!

First, I made labels that stated my “business name” (I don’t really have a business, but I guess I’m aspiring to have one?? not really sure), my website, and my email address. For my business name I used the font “Cupcake” by Miss Tinaa, and for the other information I used the font “Wulan” (also by Miss Tinaa). Check out all her fonts here. They’re adorable and, best of all, many of them are free!

(Labels)

For the body of the card, I used scrapbook paper from DCWV’s Sweet Stack. Loved every page!

(Here’s some pages from the Sweet Stack. Nice 3D on some of these)

I bought some glitter tape to adorn the cards, but soon realized that the tape would be too bling for this project. I’ll definitely save it for another time though.

(“Bling on a Roll”)

To construct the cards, I used an eraser shield to trace out rectangles with rounded corners on the back of the paper. Eraser shields are only ~$0.50 and they are the best! I got mine for a drafting class and I still use it all the time. I use it as a stencil, a straight edge, an actual eraser shield, etc. Best $0.50 I ever spent.

Then I cut the paper. Always save the scraps–trust me, you’ll eventually find a purpose for them.

Here’s a finished card minus the label:

Put the label on and you’re done!

(The cards)

(My sister says the ones in the next picture remind her of chocolate strawberry cake)

(Mike and Ike?)

A big thanks to my sister Liz for helping me construct these yesterday! Enjoy the weekend!

Pompoms

I distinctly remember the moment when I saw this picture in Teen Vogue way back in early 2010. My eyes immediately went to the pompom keychain, and I decided that I would soon have my own, one way or another.

A few weeks later, I saw this bag at the mall, and even though I liked the keychain, I hated that the bag had the word “Juicy” plastered across the front. I realized that I would probably be best off making my own pompom keychain, so I went to the craft store and made it happen!

Here’s some of my pompom keychains on a couple of bags– DIY & more pictures below!

To make your own pompom keychain, you will need:

• Pompoms (available at any craft store–I bought a bag that had a variety of colors and sizes, but if you’re going for a more uniform look, they should have bags with single colors and sizes too)
• Craft string (aka the string you make friendship bracelets out of)
• A sewing needle (with a hole big enough to fit your craft string)

That’s it– that’s literally all you need! So not only is this craft super quick and easy, it’s also really inexpensive (which is great because I’m sure the Marc Jacobs bag shown in Teen Vogue and the Juicy bag are pretty pricey. No need to spend lots of money when you can make something equally good yourself.)

To construct the keychain, first thread your needle with a piece of craft string. The length of the string really depends on how long you want your keychain to be. I wanted multiple keychains of varying lengths, so the lengths of my strings reflected that. You’ll barely see the string in the finished product, so it’s doesn’t really matter what color you choose. I chose red for some and green for others.

Tie a knot at the end of the threaded string, and start running your pompoms through to the knot. Keep adding pompoms until there are only a few inches left of the string. Then cut the string so it’s not attached to the needle anymore. Tie a knot right against the last pompom. The reason you should leave a few inches of extra string at the end of the keychain is so that you can 1) tie it directly to your bag or 2)tie it to a key ring to attach to your bag. I just tied all my keychains directly to my bags and they look clean and nice. If you have excess string at either end, you can always cut it off. I think it’s always better to overestimate the amount of string you need because you can always cut off the excess when you’re done. But if you use too little string, there’s no turning back!

I told you–this craft is super easy!! And the end result is very cute. To complement your keychain, you could also add a colorful rabbit’s foot to your bag like I did with my brown bag. Btw, my school is right near St. Marks Place in NYC, and they sell these HUGE rabbit’s feet there. I think they’re pretty interesting, but I don’t think I’m cool enough to pull them off!

The green rabbit’s foot is hiding somewhere in this picture:

Hope you like the keychain(s)! Gotta love pompoms.

NYC Subway Line Cookies

Yesterday I made these NYC Subway Cookies!

For those of you who haven’t been to NYC, here are all the subway lines. So far, I’ve been on the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, A, C, E, L, N, Q, R, and S, but I would like to conquer all the lines before I finish college!

So here’s the story about how these cookies came about. A few weeks ago, I signed up for a cake decorating class at the Michael’s Craft Store near my house. This past Monday was the first day of class, and we had to bring plain, flat cookies with us. I decided to bake my own cookies and I used this recipe from the blog “Glorious Treats” (which is really cool btw). I pretty much followed the recipe exactly, except I wasn’t too worried about my cookies being perfectly level so I didn’t use the paint stir sticks or perfection sticks.  And even though I bought parchment paper, I didn’t end up using it because my dough wasn’t sticky at all.

Even though the cookies came out really good and I would make them again, I wouldn’t suggest keeping the cookie dough in the refrigerator for 2 hours before you roll it out like the recipe suggests. Maybe my refrigerator is abnormally cold or something, but my dough was literally rock hard by the time I took it out of the fridge! I attempted to roll it out, but it just crumbled. I had to wait a while for it to warm up, and even then, I couldn’t roll out one huge sheet of cookie dough—I had to cut my cookies one by one. Nevertheless, they ended up coming out pretty good. I made 2 different sizes—4.25 in. diameter cookies and 3.25 in. diameter cookies. I got my cookie cutters at Michaels. Here are the cookies pre-decoration:

I brought the cookies to class on Monday night, but there wasn’t much time to decorate them, so I ended up keeping most of them plain. But I knew I still wanted to decorate them at home, especially because I wanted to use the new piping bags, tips, and other tools that we got in the kit for the class.  The only problem was…I couldn’t think of a cute way to decorate them! I have no problem coming up with ideas about how to decorate cupcakes, but for some reason, I was drawing a blank with these cookies. An idea finally came to me when I was riding the subway yesterday. I looked up and I saw a white A in the blue circle, and I immediately knew that I had to make subway cookies!

There is a special place in my heart for the N, Q, and R lines (well, mostly the N and the R). I commuted to school last year, and I took the N or the R to 8th Street every single weekday. I developed a sort of love-hate relationship with the subway and commuting in general. I hated commuting because it wasted so much time and was frustrating a lot of the time, but I also loved it because I got to see my family, sleep in my own bed, and eat home-cooked meals every night. This year I’m living in the city and it’s bittersweet. I’m excited about having more free time and more of a social life, but there are definitely things I will miss about living at home. Luckily, home isn’t too far away in NJ and my brother is going to NYU (which is really close to my school—I go to Cooper Union), so we’ll practically be neighbors!

(My brother, posing with the cookies)

For my summer job, I usually take the A, C, or E. Here are my 6 favorite lines together!

More pictures:

This was my first attempt at using a real piping bag, and I was able to decorate these cookies without too much frustration, so I think it’s a good place to start if you’re a beginner like me! All I did was color white icing with Wilton’s icing colors—the colors I used were Golden Yellow, Royal Blue, “No Taste” Red, Kelly Green, and Black (for the lettering of the N, Q, and R). Then I iced the cookies with a spatula. Beforehand, I looked up the subway line symbols online, copied and pasted them into Word, stretched them out so that they matched the size of my cookies, and printed them. Then I cut out the letters and used them as stencils. After I iced the cookies, I let them dry for a little bit, then I put a makeshift letter stencil down on top, traced the letter out with a toothpick, and then used the piping bag with Wilton tip 104 to fill in the outline with either the white or black icing. They’re not perfect, but I kind of like them that way—it adds character. I like when you can tell that something is homemade and not mass produced. Hope you enjoyed these cookies!

I ❤ NY!

Disney World Photos

Someone was playing the Bix Beiderbecke Pandora station at work the other day, and the music immediately reminded me of Disney World. Whenever my family goes to Disney World, we stay at a hotel on the Boardwalk. Even though the Boardwalk opened in the 1990s, it has an old-fashioned feel to it, which I love. There is a candy shop with things like big swirly lollipops, candy apples, cotton candy, etc., a little bakery, a dance hall–it just gives off that charming old fashioned vibe, you know what I mean? I had never heard of Bix Beiderbecke before the other day, but his 1920s jazz songs transport me back to that Boardwalk…I hope to go back again soon! Here’s one of his songs:

 

I think this is the perfect kind of music to have playing in the background if you’re working on something–it’s enjoyable, but not distracting. I’ve included some pictures from my family’s recent trip to Disney World (Photo cred to my dad). I tried to choose ones that give off the 1920’s boardwalk vibe. Hope you enjoy!

Old Photos

These are some of my favorite pictures I’ve taken over the past few years:

And there will be many more pictures to come in the future!