Is it Spring Yet?

FINALLY, more cake pics!  I got so busy in August and September with the tomatoes I was harvesting that blogging fell off the radar.  Then I took a short vacation (sadly, when we returned the tomatoes were clearly finished because of the first frost in mid-end September!), then wedding season was pretty much over for the season, then it was Thanksgiving and Christmas, and now it's the middle of winter and here we are covered in snow.  Weddings don't stop, of coarse, but they definitely slow down until about May -- rather parallel to gardening season, as a matter of fact.  

I've already started getting seeds and planning, but debating whether to expand the garden space.  At the least, I'm gonna try a lot of flowers from seed to plant around the perimeter of the house, which means we'll have to get a lot of compost to amend our sandy soil -- that's why I opted for raised beds for the vegetables.  I'm glad, too, because it wasn't long and we had grubs move into the lawn but so far none in the garden boxes.  I'm not sure how they'll affect the landscaping or new flowers yet -- I'm sure time will tell.  I'd also like to incorporate some kind of row covers to extend our tiny growing season, but haven't found the perfect ones yet (size is the issue so far), so we may have to fabricate some ourselves.  If we had those, I'd start planting seeds in the next week or so.  Oh, to be springtime!

Here's some pictures from the end of last season I never got around to posting:

This was a cool effect of ivory over chocolate brown using brush embroidery technique.

This has a 3D cherry tree growing up the side.

This cake was another milestone in the evolution of my piping skills -- Loose swirls of vines with tiny leaves and flowers.

This turned out really nice -- big, but still elegant and clean.