Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Holiday Baking Begins!

I have started thinking about what to bake for family and friends for this Christmas...
Last a week, I baked couple of kinds of cookies...

Peanut butter Kiss Cookies... The new recipe really works... rich peanut butter is comparable to Hersey's Kiss perfectly ;)

Made this Cranberry Orange Cookie for very first time, and it's becoming my favorite!
I realized that fresh cranberries and/or Oranges give some nice bitterness and tartness to cookies... make them taste a little more sophisticated in a way, instead of just cute and sweet.    
It needs some adjustment and experiments, but has a high potential :)

Scarfs for kids

I totally forgot that I made this before. I remember how much fun I had making this!

This scarf was for my niece for her birthday this past year, and the theme is Sky. I actually had some ideas of other themes, like Animal, sea, and such.
I would be fun to make something like this bunch more!

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Pumpkin Day

Happy Halloween!
I wasn't going to wear any costume this year... just because...
But, my friend and I are obsessed with foxes lately, so I ended up being a fox this year. Wild red fox running away from Alaska :)
I love this costume! what's so special about about it is, because it is handmade by me. It turned out pretty well ;)
Kazu was supposed to be a rebellious bug... haha.
At Halloween night, we went to Hollywood to join the parade by taking Metro.
It was chaotic, but a fox had a fun!

Thursday, October 28, 2010

Can't wait for Halloween!

Halloween is just around the corner, I'm very excited! Halloween is one of my favorite events. Love wearing a costume and stuff, but this year, I'm excited with a different reason... yes, obviously baking! and, after halloween, Thanksgiving, then, Christmas... fun's never ends :) 

I baked some cupcakes yesterday, and delivered them to my friend, Sally's place.

Then, she gave me some veggies that she's made. I cooked with fish last night. it was delicious!

viva Marzipan!

Last weekend, my friend, Chris came to stay over at my place. It's been a long time since I had the last sleepover with friends, and it was a full of fun projects, dancing and baking... oh and, needless to say, eating too haha :) 
The awesome part was, Chris got us an already-made marzipan paste for our baking creation! I love looove marzipan, and I was sooo excited to play with the amazing stuff!

We first baked a pumpkin cupcake and made frosting. Then, we created cute creatures out of the marzipan dough. Mixing with food coloring, we made a little community of colorful animals and flowers. I love it! They were too cute to be eaten though :(

 My favorites... Mr. Confused Sheep...

And, Pirates Birdie in the sky...

Sunday, October 17, 2010

Lan Sattha Perform

After I finished my baking adventure, I had a performance gig with Lan Sattha dancers for a wedding in Hollywood.It has been a month since our last performance, and I realized how much I missed.
We actually didn't have that much time to rehearse this time, but we did well. Once, we are on a stage, we were unified perfectly. It is the special magic we have :)
And, I gave the dancers the Carrot Cakes that I'd baked earlier that day.
  It is the best feeling when people love what I bake :)

Harvest!

Yesterday was such a fun day! During a day, I was mostly baking. It is hard to focus on just baking on a sunny day, but cloudy rainy day, just like yesterday, I stay home with cozy music and be a happy baker :)
I was going to have a dance gig for a wedding at night with Lan Sattha dancers who love my Carrot Cake, so I've decided to bake that.

This time, I baked them using two kinds of baking pans. I first baked Carrot Cupcakes with Cream cheese frosting on top. I love this happy crowns :)
Then, I harvested Pumpkin-looking Carrot Cakes :) Yes, I recently got this ridiculously cute baking pan, shapes of a pumpkin!
 After they were baked, I scooped out some inside, and filled with some frosting. Then, I decorated outside.
Sign... I am in love with this pan, and I still have so many ideas what to make with it.
I eventually want to make one with pumpkin puree, of course. Stay tuned ;)

To be continued...

Monday, October 11, 2010

Zoowie to the world!

I have created a character, zoowie for my nephew, Yuuta for his 1st birthday. I created zoowie and gave him a stuffed toy and painting of it.

I wanted to make something unidentified in a way, and yet very happy and uniquely adorable.
For his birthday this year, Kazutabu digitalized zoowie's image and ordered a T-shirt.

This mysterious creature will be standing by Yuuta's side and they will play and grow together ;)

Recycled Leaves

I have been working on some projects which are series of applying testing tubes. I guess they are one of my obsession lately :) I wanted to used the testing tubes as a vase for plants in a project and something potential came out during an experiment.


I first cut some organza silk and handmade papers into leaf shapes, and I layered and stitched them together. Then, I attached wire to represent stem parts.
I stamped the words "recycled leaf" because I'd made the paper from kozo Plants, and now made some plants from the paper... interesting cycle hah :)


I definitely need to develop this more to make into an actual piece, but it was fun playing with different media!
I simply like the feel of different texture together.

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Halloween Baking

During this strangely hot weather in Oct, I have been daydreaming about Pumpkin Muffins, and couldn't wait any longer to start Halloween Baking!

I baked chocolate chip pumpkin muffins. It turned out pretty well and I had fun putting the cute images on those muffins :) Stencils are fun!
Yes, it was going smoothly until... I found out the muffins were haunted!
...Well, not really :p The images I'd put got literally disappeared in a box. I guess the moisture in the box made the sugar melt, I guess... oh well. Instead, I put some edible decals of flower images on top.
 That night, I gave them to my friend and her boyfriend who held a guitar concert for a fundraiser towards breast cancer cure. It was an amazing and meaningful concert :)