Cactus and Gecko cake

 I made this cake for friends Gordon and Natalie who share January birthdays. I especially wanted to immortalize Kartini, the gecko, who passed away at the ripe age of 19. We had intended to celebrate her birthday with great fanfare, but sadly it never came to be.

I decided instead to recreated this little creature out of fondant. 

Here's the real critter in Gordon's hands, a photo I downloaded from Nat's blog.

 At any rate, they kept the sugar gecko and we dug into the red velvet cactus.

When I walked out with the cake, Nat thought I was giving her a cactus as a gift! 

What fun. 

Happy birthday you two!

Cold Day, Soup's ON!

It was darn cold today! A high of -20C with -30C over night. Time to dig around in the freezer and cook up my garden's squash from last summer. Ahhh summer. Ginger-apple-squash soup is pretty perfect at this time of year! The fruits of my labour.

Out With the Old...

 My late father's picnic table finally gave up the ghost. It's been out in the bush for about 20 years and the site of our annual winter picnic for the past five or so years...

The new and improved version is part of a double cedar wall behind the house, that was discovered this past year when my gas range was installed. I figured it would be a perfect, rustic tabletop for a new picnic table. Richard cut down two dead trees as the supports and voila! Chairs will be old plastic outdoor garden chairs that my late mother bought eons ago.
I'll post pix when it warms up a tad and we can have a picnic out in the woods.

Jack's Back Home

 In 2004, Jack and his little sister Jill showed up at my place. Luckily my friends in Montreal adopted them. Sadly, Jill died a few years back but Jack comes back to stay with me for a few weeks every Christmas when his parents vacation down south.

 Jack always had the run of the house with the three girl cats pretty much leaving him alone. But autumn's new addition of Matzo Man made me nervous.
Interestingly enough, they got along pretty well.

Jack mostly stuck to his bedroom but kept opening the door to make sure he could see what was going on in the house. And when guests stayed in the bedroom next door, Jack not only opened his door, he pushed open their door too and hopped into bed with them. See ya next year Jack. Always a pleasure.

Deer beds

 Walking in the woods we can upon a series of deer beds under the cedars.
You could see the outline of the deer's body where the snow melted around him.

 I decided to get into it and see what the view was like.

And when I looked down I saw a bit of deer fur that froze into the snow.
Sleep well my furry friends.

Birdie cupcakes

I love making cupcakes for a bird lover. Particularly when it's -27C outside and these lemony goodies remind me of spring!