Ace of Cakes

If you're one of my friends then it is very likely that I will have spoken about how AMAZING Ace of Cakes is! I am literally addicted to the show. I'm not even joking. In the holidays I watched it at least once again and I don't get bored if I see the same episodes over and over... even if it is in the same day! Some people might say that's sad but the show is truly awesome!

If you're not one of my friends then you may have heard about it anyway, because it is awesome. (If you haven't heard of it then it is on the Food Network Channel... go watch.) I think it might just be in my top 5 of favourite TV shows... almost definitely. I just think that Duff Goldman and the rest of the team at Charm City Cakes are just SO talented! They make amazing cakes and I hope that maybe I could be able to make cakes that good one day... in the future. 

I was watching the other day and they made a big dinosaur that was blowing out some candles on a cake for a museum, which was awesome even thought they did have a little bit of trouble at the moment. Also they made a cake in the shape of a German Shepherd and it was amazing. It was sort of cartoon style but the detail on it was fantastic.

The show is really funny because Duff is really just a big kid and there is always something crazy going on!  For example, I am watching it right now and Duff had a bagpipe man in the bakery...

The other day I typed 'Ace of Cakes' into google images just to see some of the things that they had done and I found this: 

Now this is a cake that the IBers will appreciate! We all have to have one of these Ti calculators and I think I would much prefer one of these calculators... yum! 

This is another doggy one that they have done and personally I think it looks very realistic. I'm not sure if I had one of these cakes that I would be able to cut into it because they are so beautiful! Who am I kidding... if I am presented with a cake OF COURSE I am going to eat it!

Back to School Tomorrow :(

Yep, it's that dreaded day tomorrow... first day of term. Not cool. I'm definitely not ready because I am enjoying this holiday too much! I know I haven't really done much, other than just relaxing the whole time and having a nice day out on Friday but still I had a really nice time!! 

The most thing is I am not looking forward to getting up at half 6 tomorrow morning! Just thinking about it makes me want to cry... ok not literally because that is a bit of an exageration but still that time SHOULDN'T ever exist... for anyone! It's a cruel thing making someone wake up before it is barely light outside. It should be made illegal.

Anyway, I suppose I should go to sleep now so byeeee!!

My Mum is the Only Fool ;)

Yesterday I went up to Croydon to see my Auntie Christine, Uncle Stan, Auntie Wendy and her little dog Tilly. We had a lovely day up there and we played The Million Pound Drop board game which was good fun... we knew barely any of the answers but still it was good fun and quite addictive! After I don't know how many games I did manage to win £175000 of fake money (damn...), and my Auntie Christine managed to win £50000 (or something like that, it could be more.) 

On the journey up there in the car we were listening to the Only Fools and Horses audio CD and it was so funny! But what was funnier was my mum laughing... as you can see in the video above! Mum was laughing like mad for ages and it was actually funnier than listening to the actual tape properly. So I decided to secretly film her on my phone... muhahahahahahaha!

Amy Chasing Her Tail

I was sitting at my computer last night and my cat had just got onto my bed and heard some rustling around so I had a look to find her chasing her own tail! She did it again so I decided to get my phone out and film just in case she did. And she did :) I thought it was funny because I had never seen her do that before and I thought that was just a thing dogs did... apparently not!

Heston's Mission Impossible

You may know that I am a fan of cooking shows! Heston Blumenthal's shows are probably one of my favourites because he tends to make crazy food like lick-able wall paper from his Willy Wonka feast, a huge ginger bread house and an edible garden complete with bugs that you can eat! When I watched the series of Heston's Feasts I was dying to eat quite a lot of what he made as I was intrigued as to what they tasted like... especially the bugs!

On Tuesday, I watched the first episode of Heston's Mission Impossible. In the first episode he was visiting Alder Hey Children's Hospital so that he could try and improve the food because it was mostly all packet food from frozen, which obviously not healthy for the children. 

There was this man called Geoff, who was the head of catering at the hospital (I think), and he told Heston that 90% of the hospital's food was made from scratch. Heston has literally just been in the kitchen to try a sample of the food given to the children and it consisted of baked beans, potato waffles and pizza (I think the pizza was made though) and so I didn't really believe it! Heston said that he had just tried it and that all he saw was food from frozen so Geoff took him down to the kitchen. The chefs were preparing lots of things like stroganoff etc from scratch! It was so different from what Heston had just been shown but then one of the chefs revealed that the stroganoff and all the other decent stuff they made was for the staff! 

I was a bit shocked as Geoff had made it out to sound that this food was for the children so I thought he was a bit of an idiot as he didn't really seem to care about the people who actually need good food! 

Anyway, Heston changed the lunch menu into some nice freshly prepared sandwiches that the chefs came up with and they put them on a nice decorated trolley with balloons and stuff like that to make it more exciting for the Children. I thought that was a really lovely thing to do and they even took the chefs up to see the children's reactions. There was one chef in particular that really wasn't for the change but seeing this turned her round more in favour of Heston.

He then changed the dinner menu to a menu called 'I bet you can't eat it' or something along those lines so that it will give the children a challenge and make it more exciting for them to eat something different and out of the ordinary. The menu including things like snot shake, worm pizza, tomato eye balls, vomit soup etc and the  large majority of the children really liked the change. 

The people in charge decided to keep Heston's lunch menu and send out a questionnaire to all the children to decided what parts of the dinner menu to keep. I thought Heston did a really good job and I personally would mind a snot shake! They look quite nice. 

This Tuesday coming up is the next episode where he tries to change cinema food in Cineworld so I shall definitely watch that.

My Cat is Awesome

After my last blog, which I literally post 2 minutes before starting this one, I thought that I should share with you how awesome my cat is as she hasn't really ever got much of a mention. How mean of me. I'm ashamed. Well not really... 

This is a picture when she was just a little ball of kitten fluffiness! Adorable! Some of you will know that her name is Amy, or Bubbychops (if you're my mum.) A lot of people ask me why we gave her a 'human name.' Well, I don't really know. The name suited her and we didn't want to go with anything typical for a black and white cat, like Socks, even though they are such cute names!

(This beautiful photo was taken by my sister in the summer.) Amy is now 5 years old (6 next month) and A LOT bigger than in the previous picture! That doesn't make her any less cute though. Look at her, isn't she lovely. My mum thinks that she has 'a sexy bum' but we just tell her that she is weird... which is true! One of the reasons why my cat is so awesome is because she has got such an amazing character, I could literally just watch her all day! I love the way she gallops up the garden like a horse, the was she is persistent in trying to get into my brother's room even though she isn't allowed because James is a meany (heheh just as I was writing that I heard my brother say 'Amy!' as a way to make her stop going in his room as he was making a coffee), the way she gets into the strangest places just because she is a nosey cat and so much more!
I even like the game where she scratches at my door, I open the door and she is gone, close the door again and she scratches... it goes on!

In the summer we eat our roast dinner outside at the patio table and I came in for a drink to find Amy up on the side having a nice munch at the chicken. Naturally I left her there and got my phone for a picture, then got her down. She's just so cheeky.

(This was also taken by my sister) She literally plays with everything and anything... tin foil, sweet wrappers, shoe laces, coat toggles, my dressing gown belt, feet, news paper etc. Once when she was a kitten she even climbed up my nan's skirt while she was making a cup of coffee. I have to say that was hilarious.

(Another picture taken by my sister.) As you can see... she is so photogenic! Basically, she likes to bite. She likes to play games where you tickle her tummy and then she sort of fights back and bites my hand. It's cute and funny because sometimes she kicks herself in the head.

This last picture, taken by me, is added because it is funny. Whenever we go swimming or use certain products in our hair my cat likes to get on our heads and rub against the hair and lick it... I know, weird! It's really funny and feel quite odd! This picture just captures the moment perfectly! I do believe that we have a video of this in action while she is on my head somewhere so if we still have it I will add it when I find it!

While I was writing this Amy came and scratched my door... her ears must be burning or something.

Doggy Dentures

I have been meaning to share this on my blog for a while now because every single time that this advert is on TV it makes me smile! Not quite in the way that the little dogs smile on the advert but something a bit less than that, I'm not some kind of weirdo... oh, wait, maybe I am :/ never mind, you can make your own mind up on that one. 

Anyway, I just thought it is such a great advert and I wish my cat had teeth like this... even though she's not a dog but still it would be pretty funny and it would hurt less when she bites me. 

I hope you like this advert as much as I do!

The Wonderful World of Sims

Half term started last Friday.. thank God! So I have taken the opportunity to have a play on Sims 3 because I haven't been on it for a while. I have had Sims 3 Ambitions for a while now and it is really good! I quite like fire fighting on there because it is probably one of the most exciting jobs on there as you literally have to go to the houses to put out the fires.
 

Last week my sister got the Sims 3 Late Night expansion pack and on that you can become a celebrity, go to night clubs and bars, live in apartments and become a vampire etc. My sister let me on this on Saturday and Sunday evening and I think it is really good! I decided that I would become a celebrity because every time I went into a night club they wouldn't let me in the VIP section... not cool! I started off the easy way... with the use of come cheats that made friends for me. Once I have done this a few times I was then friends with some celebrities and had level 4 celeb rating (it is out of 5). 

Anyway, being a cleebrity has some great perks! I got into all the clubs, and I get lots of discounts (£4000 in the book store where I spent £9000... not bad I'd say) but I did get falsely accused of peeing in public which was quite amusing but it's all good because I sued them for that - job done! I did get publicly disgraced for 'woohooing' in a public elevator! Cheeky I know but my lifetime wish on there was the 'woohoo' in 5 different places with 5 different sims.

Actually there was this vampire guy who started flirting and I went with this other guy and the vampire got so angry and then blew up or something and turned to ash! I was thinking 'what the hell, the vampire is a little pile of ash.' The grim reaper came fore him but decided to give him a second chance! This vampire guy went from hating me to being my best friend - which was a bit weird. 

Anyway! Today I went back on Ambitions for a bit! I decided to set my woman up to do lots of inventing! After catching herself on fire at least 3 times (picture below) she managed to invent a time machine!! This is something which I think would be pretty cool to have in real life. I could do so much with it. I told my friend Amy that I would create one some day and then we could go back in time... hmm!

Anyway with the time machine it came up with an option saying 'try for a baby in the past' so I thought 'yes, that sounds like fun.' They came out of the time machine and started having a chat and then a minute later this ginger teenager named Randell (I didn't name him) wearing a knight's costume comes out moaning about being left in a cave! It turns out this is my son haha! He immediately started cooking hot dogs and started a fire... silly fool! So I decided to se what happens if you literally make them eat ALL the time so I made lots of hot dogs and he ate them all! He became fat... but it's ok I will make him thin again because I bought a tredmill - yay! 

We'll have to see how these lives turn out...

The Absurd

Today in my English lesson we watched the rest of the the film, 'Perfume' (which was incredibly weird and graphic in places) and then after that we started talking about something called absurdism, which my teacher said is used in our next book, 'The Outsider'. 

According to Wikipedia absurdism is:

'the conflict between the human tendency to seek inherent meaning in life and the human inability to find any. In this context absurd does not mean "logically impossible," but rather "humanly impossible."' 

My teacher said it was to do with the repetitive fashion that we tend to lead out lives and about people constantly searching for a reason why we do it. This did make me think about how repetitive life is. We do the same thing every day which seems a little bit pointless. 

Surely there is more to life than doing the same thing day in day out, so I was thinking that perhaps I ought to do some more interesting things more often, something that I don't do everyday just to spice life up a bit! 

However, thinking of these things is a completely different story! I am going to need a bit of help with this one I think! So, if you're reading this blog and you can think of anything interesting (and realistic) for me to do then either comment below or if you know me then just tell me in person because I am a little bit stuck!

I was trying to think of some of the things that I have done that are interesting, different or out of the ordinary for me and this is what I have come up with: 

• I climbed Mount Snowdon the year before last to raise money for Marie Curie Cancer. I did this with my Mum and my Step-dad and it was AMAZING! We managed to climb to the summit and back down in 4 and a half hours. I can't remember exactly how much we raised but it was definitely over £300, perhaps £400 so it was well worth it. 
• Towards the end of last year I entered an art exhibition at my local art gallery, in which I came 3rd so I was obviously very pleased (especially as I had no idea that there were prizes.)
• I went to Paris with my school which was the MOST amazing school trip EVER! It was close to 40 degrees celcius but we did so many things and I have so many great memories so I will never forget it! 
• I wrote a story with my friend, Dan, about him and a banana called Colin.
• I met the cheeky girls - my Dad made me go up to get an autograph (saddo.)

Amy suggested that I write about making my 'amazing cakes' that I make for people's birthday in this list of interesting things I have done but even that isn't really different or anything like that because I do that all the time! I tend to make the same cakes unless I have a special request from someone so really this is one of those repetitive things that I do so perhaps they get less and less special but I don't know. I enjoy making them, people enjoy eating them, I always get some nice compliments so I guess they are a good thing so I will continue to make them.

So yeah any ideas you have about random things that I can do, please comment or tell me in person! Thanks. 

Nostalgia got the better of me

So yesterday I was dusting my bookcase when I came across a little book that just caught my eye, it was the one and only 'Winnie-The-Pooh' by A.A.Milne! Of course there was no question about whether I took it off of the book case to have a look - of course I did! 

(And literally a minute ago when writing the previous section I look over at my bookcase to the place where I removed the Winnie-The-Pooh book from I see... another one.)

Anyway, I was lying in bed last night and nothing interesting was on TV for about another half an hour and so I asked my sister if I could read the first story of 'Winnie-The-Pooh' to her (there are 10 stories in the book) and she said yes :) so I started off reading out loud to Zoe and by the time I was nearing the bottom of the 2nd page I removed my top retainer, realising I had a little bit of a lisp which was INCREDIBLY annoying!

I continued reading, doing my best to do the voices but probably failing to do them well, but then my sister decided that hearing me read made her want to read her book, 'Skulduggery Pleasant', so she went and got her book from her bedroom. I was a little bit disappointed as I now had to read in my head and that isn't as fun, especially when it comes to all the voices. 

For all of you who like and remember Winnie-The-Pooh stories well then I was reading the one where Pooh tried to get the honey from the tree by pretending to be a rain cloud attached to a balloon. I was a little bit confused at one point when Pooh asked Christopher Robin if he had a balloon and he did but Christopher Robin went to the tree with Pooh and in the book it says:

'Well you both went out with the blue balloon and you took your gun with you, just in case, as you always did.'

 I was thinking, 'what the hell, did I read that right?' so I read it again... and sure enough it did say that Christopher Robin had a gun with him. What. The. Hell. What does a little kid in a CHILDREN'S' book need with a gun! A bit odd I know but I kept reading... he used it to pop the balloon. But still, surely he they could have used something other than a gun, a slingshot perhaps. Something less violent than a gun (even though he didn't use it in a violent way.

(I do realise that in the illustration it is a gun with a piece of sting attached to it, but still how could it have shot the balloon in the air with such a short piece of string? I know, as my friend said - 'but it is fictional.' Which is very true but it did made me stop and have to read again. Made me laugh a little too at the thought of a kid walking out of a house with a gun, before we know it is a cork one.)

This morning, I read 2 more of the stories and they are just so adorable and so I am definitely going to read more because they are only very short and so don't take very long at all to read! And I also fully intend to read the stories in the second book too!

**While thinking of a topic for a blog I had looked over at the books and it reminded me about nostalgia so really it is inspired by my friend, Maddy who vlogs on youtube because her last one was about nostalgia! http://www.youtube.com/user/thevoiceofmanyfaces Go watch her, NOW - please (I have manners, you see)**

Just being plain silly

This morning I was woken by mum coming into my room and sort of shouting 'Steph, its 7:30' and I was thinking, surely I can't have overslept that much so I looked at my alarm clock and noticed the display was flashing and it was apparently 1.45 which meant that we must have  had a power cut. 

To be honest I was pretty pleased about having an extra hour in bed! It's amazing how much of a difference it makes. It was even better as I went to bed slightly earlier the night before as I was SO tired yesterday so the lay in was much needed - the power must have known :)

I felt 10 times better this morning as I had the morning before as I could actually keep my eyes open! Always a good thing! Yesterday, I was just about to fall asleep in tech when a friend Dan scared me because he could see I was just about to fall asleep. It was a bit of a shock because I was not expecting that at all, of course. Then, in my other 2 lessons I was getting a bit irritated by certain things but it was probably just because I was quite tired! 

But today was so much better, so one hour really does make a difference! I was much more happy, smiley and bubbly today (like I am usually) and I had a much better day. I was asked to do a psychological test by a friend, Panthia, where she said a word and then I had to say the first word that came into my head. After  this, I had a short distraction and then I had to try and remember the words that I said. 

I thought that I would make a bit of fun out of this so when the words were said I came out with some really odd things, which is a bit worrying about what goes through my head sometimes. 

Here are some of the words and my answers:

Original Words                          My words

Vomit                                        Bleugh - not a word but I literally had no other word

Assault                                        Vinegar - Its not related but it sounded like salt, so I thought vinegar

Jumper                                      Kangaroo - I've got to be different

Yellow                                      Amarillo - The Spanish word

Panthia said that I came up with the strangest and most original answers - surprising really ;) I'm not even sure what was going through my head but at least it was a laugh and I managed to remember 10 out of the 12 words so that is pretty good I would say!

So basically, I had a fun day and wasn't sleep deprived! Good day I'd say :)

Happy Birthday!

To most people today is just like any other day, nothing special, nothing too important, normal. But according to my friend Amy it is the most important day ever. Don't know why that is, it must have slipped my mind! 

...

...

...

Nope, I still don't have clue.. OH I know, it's her birthday! 

Happy birthday Amy!! Let's have a little sing song... 

Happy birthday to you, 

You live in a Zoo, 

You look like a monkey, 

Aaaaand you smell like one, too! 

Yep, that song was absolutely perfect for her, right Amy?

For Amy's present I brought out my creative side and made a pretty damn awesome card (which I am quite proud of) I also made a story board of the story of Dan and Colin, because it is an awesome story. And finally, I am pretty proud of my photo-shopping skills - I think Amy will agree that it is amazing! She seemed pretty happy when I gave it to her and it gave her laugh so I would say I have succeeded.

Just like Amy had near my birthday, I have had a running countdown from her for AT LEAST 3 weeks just to let me know how many days it was until her birthday. I can't remember when, but I promised Amy that I would write her a birthday blog (hence why I am writing this) because she always reads my blogs. I hope you enjoyed the blog Amy and enjoy the rest of your day!!

"I'm Just Cheese"

Many of my friends will know that I am a cheese string fan as I have one in my lunch box every day, but they say that I don't eat them properly because usually I just eat in the same way you would eat a sausage or a banana rather than peeling bits off! Occasionally I do peel but most of the time I just can be bothered with doing all that, even though it doesn't really require much effort. So I suppose they are right, so I will try and eat them properly as much as possible - you heard it here first :)

My friend, Lauren, asked me today if I had seen the cheese string spaghetti advert and yes, I had and then she said "yeah, when I dry my hair and don't straighten it... I look like that!" Obviously that made me laugh because that would be really funny if she literally had a giant afro on her head and so I asked if she dries her hair and then says "I'm just cheese". I can just imagine that, it would be so funny!

Anyway, on to my main reason for the blog - cheesestring top trumps! Recently cheese string have been putting 6 cards in each pack of cheese string so you can collect all 30 of them. (The cards are of Mr Strings in different countries, such as Australia, Kenya, Japan etc.) Well, I have 25 and in addition to that I have got 16 double/triples of some of the cards and I also gave 4 of them away to my friend, Amy, today. I'm a little disappointed as I have noticed that cheese string have STOPPED putting the cards in their packs of cheese string and I am thinking 'excuse me, I am 5 short. And where the hell if the UK in these cards?' I mean how dare they stop, I was getting all excited about maybe being able to complete my pack of cards but... NO... my dreams have been shattered - how depressing!

I am hoping that they might bring them back a some point or something because I would quite like those last 5 cards to add to my collection!

P.s. Amy has been reminding me that is is 5 days until her birthday ALL DAY so she'll be happy if I mention it - not like it's important or anything. ;)