Archive for the ‘What I'm Doing’ Category
what i’m doing: two floral arranging classes in one month
Thursday, December 3rd, 2009
Do you ever see those cute flower bunches at Costco or at an outside market? What do you do with them once you get home? I usually take my bouquet and cut off the ends and put them in a vase. I fool myself into believing that they are “wild” and “naturally” arranged. That they look good like that. Um, no. They don’t. I recently took two different floral arranging classes from two completely opposite teachers. One from an extension program through a local university and one at the Art Weekend that I recently attended. The first teacher was an old school, east coast professor type and the other was a hip, self taught wedding florist. I liked them both. And I will admit that with taking just two basic classes, I feel confident that I can now turn a simple bunch of flowers into a decent arrangement. Don’t get me wrong, flower arranging is a total skill that takes time to master. And I’d always prefer to have a pro do it for me. But in the comfort of my own home, surrounded by my four adoring kids who basically think everything I do is genius (they’re still young, okay?) I definitely have enough confidence to make some centerpieces for us. This is a fun and relatively inexpensive hobby and I would recommend a class like these to anyone. Did you see that Jane Packer has classes in NYC? Good thing I know a cool brother with an apartment there… And sometimes Eddie Ross will post a floral arranging class taught by him. I love Eddie Ross. Oh, and p.s. telling a professional florist that you buy flowers at Costco and just trim the ends and then throw the whole thing into a random vase is like telling your photography teacher that you always shoot on auto. They look at you horror stricken. Horror stricken, like you just admitted to a horrible crime. So if you find yourself in a similar situation, keep that little bit of info to yourself.
Three things that I learned:
1. Don’t make your arrangements too tall or else people will move them off of the table. Both instructors mentioned this.
2. Choose your vase and THEN find flowers that will look good in it. Interesting, since I always do the opposite.
3. Put your greens in first in a nice even distribution. No, put your greens in last to fill in the holes. Some contradiction between the two teachers, so either way is fine, I say.
Okay, I totally arranged both of these centerpieces. (Keep in mind that I didn’t get to choose the flowers, they were provided at the classes, so don’t judge.) And my photography is improving too, right?
Tags: flowers
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what i’m doing: the art weekend & spark the event
Wednesday, November 4th, 2009
I have such a fun weekend planned–all starting tomorrow! It’s packed full of so much craftiness. The amazing & super sweet photographer Nicole Hill Gerulat and her awesome crew are putting on The Art Weekend. I’m signed up for 5 classes: Floral Arranging, Photo 101, and Tabletop Photography on Thursday. And on Friday I’m taking Screenprinting and Bookbinding. Nicole has rounded up so many fabulous teachers that I wish I could take MORE classes.
Unfortunately Spark the Event is also this weekend. (Our fair state never has cool stuff like this. Why oh why did they both have to be the same weekend?) Anyway, I am overlapping classes a little bit on Friday so I’ll be hurrying back and forth between the two (luckily both events are in downtown Salt Lake City). Hosted by the darling & talented Rhonna Farrer, Margie Romney-Aslett, Jefra Linn, and Elizabeth Kartchner, Spark is going to be a once in a lifetime experience. They have rented out the historic monument site This Is The Place that is full of cool old buildings. It is Utah history to a tee. They are offering a bunch of mini classes on Friday. And on Saturday, there is a fabrics class, jewelry class, photography class, and a paper crafting/journaling class. I’m even making a weekend of it and staying in a hotel in the city to save on driving time. Anyone else going to one or both events?
Tags: art weekend, spark
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what i’m doing: halloween cookies at viking
Tuesday, October 27th, 2009
Maybe I should name this post: A trend that I don’t think will last. I took the designer cookie class workshop over the weekend at my local Viking Cooking School. It was fun. Chef Bryan from a local TV station was our chef. I hung out with my amazing design assistant Kara while we decorated Halloween cookies and learned some cool techniques using sugar cookies, fondant and royal icing. But even without eating any of the cookies, I’m pretty sure fondant on a cookie is a bad idea. Sure, it can look pretty (don’t look at my cookies for an example of that) but everyone knows that fondant doesn’t taste good. And cookies are supposed to taste good. Honestly, I don’t know where this trend is going. Let’s rank frosting by taste: 1. fondant (not so yummy) 2. royal icing (better, but really not yummy) 3. buttercream (yummiest). My prediction: I don’t see much of a future for cookies covered in yucky frosting. Proof: even my somewhat-sugar-starved kids wouldn’t eat them.
Tags: cooking class
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what i’m doing: touchpoint with startup princess
Thursday, October 1st, 2009
I attended the Startup Princess Event called Touchpoint a few weeks ago on September 11th. It was amazing and full of so many great speakers and thought provoking ideas. We were honored to listen to Amy Rees Anderson, Heather Bailey, Janice Croze, and Tony Litster. It was cool to hear how all of these great business people have had rough times. Often people like that seem like they have practically had their fabulous life handed to them. I loved the stories about their bad times too–makes them seem human after all. Here is a link to the play by play. But the best part was that I finally got to meet a bunch of my local twitter & blog friends in real life since a lot of them attended the conference.
Tags: start up princess
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what i’m doing: photo class with candice stringham
Wednesday, September 30th, 2009
I’m signed up for a bazillion classes right now. Currently I’m enrolled in an online photography class taught by Candice Stringham called “Oh Shoot.” Candice is an amazing and cute teacher. Unfortunately, I really stink at using my digital camera. I’m not sure if there is any hope… You all know that I hire professional photographers to shoot my parties, right? Right? The really bad photos on my blog are mine. Luckily I’m signed up for 3 more photography classes over the next few months (these ones are more hands on) but I’ll tell you more about those later. Did I mention that her class sold out in less than three hours? People from all over the world are signed up.
Tags: photography class
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what i’m doing: cake decorating class course one
Tuesday, September 29th, 2009
I took my first cake decorating course about seven years ago with 3 really close and funny friends. We had so much fun and I really enjoyed the classes. From just this one course I learned enough to decorate my kids’ cute birthday cakes for years. This month I decided to retake the classes. It was great as a refresher, but my instructor kept trying to convince me week after week that I would use the frosting rose the most in my cake decorating. Huh? Maybe if you frost cakes at a grocery store. And second she thought that as soon as we graduated from cake making class that we’d all be decorating entire cakes with a star tip. Is that even feasible?
I’m not really this mean. I promise that I kept my mouth shut in class and only thought these things–never said them aloud. I’ll be starting the second course soon. With a different teacher at a different location. I can’t wait!
Tags: cake class
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what i’m doing: cutsie cakes is opening soon
Saturday, August 1st, 2009
Since all of my posts this week have been about cupcakes, I thought I’d mention this darling cupcake shop opening near my house: Cutsie Cakes Cupcakery and Gift Boutique. Okay, I’m on vacation and not anywhere near my house, but I have been dying for this place to open since it’s so CLOSE to my house. With promises of occasional vegan cupcakes, I’m there! I did happen to be in town for a minute and I drove by and talked to Amber, the owner. She was so nice and she said just a few more weeks! YAY! If you live near Layton, UT then check it out. Address: 354 North Main Street (between Gordan and Gentile).
Tags: party info
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what i’m doing: cupcakes and cake balls at viking
Thursday, July 30th, 2009
A few weeks ago I attended the Viking Cooking School for a class called “Cupcakes and Cake Balls.” It was fun. We were divided into 3 groups and each group made one flavor of cupcake and one flavor of cake ball, so a total of 6 different flavors.
I was in the red velvet group and we had some *ahem* setbacks with our cake balls. It was good practice though, and I think I know what to do differently next time. I had to use the picture of them all finished on the fancy platter so it would look like they kind of turned out. Although it didn’t work for my group, I thought the styrofoam was a good idea for holding your cake ball pops while they are cooling. For more complete instructions, check out Bakerella.
We also made cupcakes and I learned some fun techniques. I was in the caramel apple group. Our cupcakes were baked without a liner and while they were cooling in the cupcake pan we poked holes in the tops of the cupcakes and poured a caramel syrup over the tops that soaked in. We shaped almond paste into a carrot and an apple and used these to decorate the tops of the carribean carrot and the caramel apple. A whole clove was used for the apple’s stem. We also dipped the tops of the decadent chocolate fudge cupcakes into a melted chocolate mixture. I’d never done that with cupcakes and it was super easy and fun. I don’t think I’m authorized to post the recipes here, but I’m sure you could find similar cake recipes to use.
The most interesting things I learned:
1. All of us at the class live at a high altitude, so the head chef told us to adjust for this by halving all leavening in our recipes (baking powder & baking soda). I tried it later and it totally works.
2. Not all pre-made fondants are the same. The head chef brought two brands and they were completely different textures.
3. For fondant rolling, put cornstarch into a double layered cheesecloth square and tie it up with a rubber band. Just dab it onto to your work area so that your fondant doesn’t stick, kind of like flouring a surface to roll out sugar cookies.
4. The head chef taught us how to make a frosting bag from parchment paper. I’m not going to attempt to describe it here, but it’s a great option when you don’t want to put melted chocolate in your good frosting bags and then waste all of the chocolate when you clean out your bags. She said we could put the parchment bags in the fridge with the unused chocolate and after it cools you can just peel off the parchment and reuse the chocolate.
5. And last but not least, I learned that I would definitely do more baking if I had four chefs offering advice and cleaning up everything as I went along.
My box of goodies to take home. You can see why I leave my party photography and baking to the pros.
Tags: party info
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designing unforgettable events in the salt lake city area.
oh.
and everywhere else, too.
