Kidney Walk

I had a very interesting and emotional day. A few weeks ago my massage teacher notified my class of the Kidney Walk in Duluth. The walk was looking for massage therapist students to volunteer their time for the walkers and volunteers on walk day. I had originally not signed up to give massages that day but after some fellow students cancelled I volunteered to take their place.

Now I didn't think too much about the walk. I didn't really know too much about what it was about and for whatever the reason I didn't think it was that important. Not because kidney disease or failure isn't serious, I just didn't understand. But, I was very, very wrong. It was very important to so many people.

This morning my friend Melissa, a fellow student, and I met up and DBU and carpooled down to Bayfront for the walk. We set up our chairs and waited for the first people to show up for complimentary massages. Within minutes I found out why this walk was so important and so emotional for so many people. There were two young girls there, maybe 6 and 7, holding a sign that said 'We Walk for Our Brother' and there was a picture of a little toddler boy on the picture. My friend and I were almost in tears when we saw them.

There were also people there with shirt that read 'In honor of Bill, 05/05/12'. Their fellow friend and family member had died less then two weeks ago from a kidney condition.

The hardest one for me was this young boy. His brother and him were maybe 2 years old and they were running around playing. He kept walking by us and I noticed right away that he had blotches and scabby areas all over his face. He walked a tiny bit slower and had a look to his face that I just couldn't forget. I soon noticed that his picture was on the back of quiet a few peoples shirts. It turned out he was sick with a kidney disease. Broke my heart.

I also gave a massage to a lady with a kidney disease. And there was another lady who was being worked on who had just had a funeral the day before for a family member and friend.

It was a hard day and very emotional. I had to keep from crying so many times. But, it was amazing because although it was emotional, everyone had such a light hearted attitude. Everyone was laughing, joking around, and over all just having a good time. I completely salute the families and friends that were there walking for their loved ones.

Congratulations Kidney Walkers for raising over $70,000 today!

so many babies

There are so many babies in my family. I love each and every one of my nieces and nephews! 

From left to right: Tyvan (4), Liam (2), Kyeson (almost 1), Trynica (almost 6), Brendyn (6), Wyatt (1), Berlin (4), Vienna (2), Elizek (almost 2), and Gabriel (3). 

There are 10 children so far ages 6 and under. One more on the way, my sister Kristy's baby is due in June! 

I love these little munchkins!

How to make a cake...

If you have ever made a big fancy cake before, you know that it is a lot of work. It is fun work and it's rewarding and the look on peoples faces when you give them their cake is priceless and enough payment in itself. I love making cakes for people and I love it when people give me free reign when designing the cakes because then I feel free to be as creative as possible. It's awesome!

Some people don't get why it takes so long to make the cakes that I do. I completely understand where they are coming from. I didn't think it took that long either... until I made one and then I understood. So here are some of the steps to making a cake, and, I didn't even take pictures of it all, but what can I say, I'm forgetful! :)

First you must make the cake of course :)

Now you can make your cake from scratch or from a box. It all depends on what you prefer! Making the cake actually takes forever. Well, if you had lots of pans and a double oven it wouldn't take that long, but I only have two pans of the big sizes and one 6 inch pan, so that's 12 minutes per layer times however many layers there are. This particular cake had lots of layers because it was an orange creamsicle devil chocolate cake and it needs lots of layers... the more layers the yummier it tastes!

You want all your layers to be the same so you may want to measure how much you put into each pan...

YUM!!!! Then the cakes must cool down :)

For this cake I had to make the delicious orange cream filling. 

Then we fill the layers! Oh yes! Come to Mama :) In the middle is the orange filling, then a ring of cool whip, and then chocolate frosting! The orange filling melts if it's next to the chocolate frosting, so there must be a barrier in between them. 

Continue stacking...

You could just leave the cake like this if you wanted too... but what fun would that be? :)

Then we dirty ice the tier. I covered the whole thing in chocolate icing and it needs to be as smooth as possible, though it doesn't have to be perfect because you are going to cover it in fondant... Then you stick it in the fridge to settle and get the frosting to harden a bit. 

Then, bad me I didn't take pictures of it, but you cover the tier in fondant. This takes practice and more practice. This cake had some ripples in it that in some cakes I would have normally smoothed out but the theme was a cowboy cake. That meant that I got to do a bandana pattern on the cake and I thought the ripples added character to the bandana/cloth idea. Anyway, I made a fondant rope, scratched it to make it look more real and put it around the bottom of both tiers. Then I hand painted the bandana pattern on both tiers as well. 

For whatever cake you make, and if you want figures on the cake, this is when you would put them on.  You can cut out fondant figures by hand or with cookie cutters. You attach them to the cake with either water or frosting, both act as a glue. 

Then stack the tiers and put on any final touches. And there you have it! A cowboy themed birthday cake!