Cake, Cupcakes and Comic Con

I spent most of my Friday working on the cake for my Grandmother's birthday (she turned 92). I ended up staying up until 5:30 am working on it, thanks in large part to the fact that I had to try three different filling recipes before I found one that I liked, and thanks to my confirming that pasteurized egg whites do not, in fact, whip up enough to make meringue.

I woke up at 9:30 am on Saturday and continued working on the cake, finally finishing it at 4 pm. Dinner was that evening, but as I was showering, my mom called to tell me that my grandmother was going to the hospital because of hypoglycemia (she's diabetic). Apparently she had a urinary tract infection that was causing her body to burn through glucose. So unfortunately, dinner and her birthday celebration was cancelled.

She finally went home yesterday, and seems to be better, thankfully. They gave her antibiotics for the infection and got her glucose level stabilized. We ended up having a family lunch on Sunday at my aunt's house, and I brought the cake with me then. We ended up having to wrap it up and seal it so that we could put it in the fridge Saturday night. Fondant doesn't usually deal with refrigeration well, as it tends to sweat as it warms up, so I had to babysit it with a blow dryer on cool to keep it dry.

The cake itself turned out pretty well! My petunias looked good, and I was able to get the two tiers together without much drama. The only tough part was doing the drop strings - I definitely need to get more practice on those.

(I ended up showing my grandmother a picture of the cake when I went to visit her in the hospital - it wasn't quite the same though!)

After lunch, we out for dinner with Steve and Erin and the kids for Erin's birthday. It was a hot day, but the hostess at the restaurant assured us that there was a nice breeze and that the outdoor patio seating would be nice. Unfortunately, there turned out to be no breeze at all, so it was pretty warm out there! We still had a nice time though.

On Monday I went to have lunch with some of my old coworkers in South San Francisco, then drove to the hospital to visit my grandmother. When I got home, I started working on the cupcakes that Marc needed for a work party. I ended up making six dozen cupcakes in three different flavors, with about six different combinations of flavors. Somewhere in there I made dinner too. I was up until 3 am working on the cupcakes. Late night baking isn't much fun.

I hung out with Cynthia on Tuesday (she has the week off). We had lunch, then went to see Knight and Day, which wasn't a masterpiece, but it was entertaining. We grabbed some boba tea after and went back to my house to play Mario Bros Wii. I think we played for like three hours - it was massively entertaining trying to play that game with two people. Then we drove down to Milpitas and met up with Marc and Steve (both coming from work) to have dinner. We both thought we could get used to this kind of arrangement if neither of us was working, haha.

Marc and I may be going down to Disneyland this weekend with Elaine and her boyfriend, Dean. It'll be nice to get away for a couple days. So, Disneyland, Comic Con, and at some point, Hawaii. Vacation plans for the rest of the year!