Jenny's (belated) birthday

I've been busy busy with school these days, but I've fit in a little bit of fun here and there.  I just haven't had enough time to blog about it . . .
Anyway, this is a belated post about Jenny's birthday happenings.

St. Bride's Church in London

Usually, it's a bit of a bummer when someone makes their own birthday cake, but Jenny's case was an exception.  She told me the week before her birthday that her current architecture project was going to take the form of a cake - a wedding cake - which would be due on her actual birthday.  She first asked for my help just transporting the cake to school, but I insinuated myself a little more and ended up getting to help with the decorating as well.  The cake was modeled after St. Bride's church in London, which supposedly inspired the wedding cake tradition.

             Jenny baked for days in advance, and made cake layers of all different flavors.  I stepped in for the final fondant rolling and frosting piping, and we had a great afternoon of it, followed by a very slow and smooth drive to school.
            Of course, the cake didn't turn out quite as great as either of us had pictured in our minds, but still it turned out pretty good, considering it was a first try at anything wedding-cake-ish.

On her actual birthday, I gave Jenny a pin that I had bought for her the weekend before, at the Renegade Craft Fair.  I had a little too much fun wrapping it up in an old Tiffany's box, which I spiced up with some red ribbon (my signature color scheme!).

          And since we wanted her classmates to be able to have some cake (but not break into the big one), I used the extra leftover cut-off bits to make some cake balls.  Like the cake, they didn't turn out quite as pretty as I had imagined, partially because Jenny was borrowing my frosting tips.  They tasted yummy, anyway.