Time to build the arc.

Shhhhh. What is that sound? I think it is the toilet running downstairs. I am just going to go back to bed and check it out in the morning. Lucky for both of us that Jonathan heard the noise too and decided to go downstairs and investigate. At 5 am we found that our heating pipe had burst in the dining room and had been pouring water out!

Jonathan ran downstairs and shut off the water while I strategically assessed the damage. Let's see the carpet is trashed since the water has a black soot in it. I removed the dining room table and chairs before they could get any water damage. Perhaps I can just use the carpet extractor and that would at least get a bunch of the water up.

Here is the dining room pipe and where the obvious break was. This is after we removed the wet carpet and threw it outside on the back porch. It was so heavy and just drenched. The floor boards underneath were soaked and it even spread a little into the living room.

When Jonathan came back upstairs I gave him my professional opinion about how I didn't think the damage was going to be that bad. His only reply was "You need to go look at the basement".

The entire workout corner of our basement was completely soaked! Water was pouring out of the ceiling like a waterfall. The tiles were drenched and falling down from the weight and the carpet was saturated.

Hence instead of showing off my beautiful cake (as seen in the last blog) or going to work I spent all day extracting water from the carpet. We couldn't get a hold of our insurance guy nor was the 1-800 number helpful. So in turn I called everyone (Jonathan's parents, my mom and my brother and sister in law) at the crack of dawn trying to figure out what needed to be done. Good morning to everyone!

Brian and Gramps came over to help try and fix the pipe since we had no water or heat. We later found out that we could turn on the main water valve and it would not effect the heating pipes. So at least we had water in the house. Poor Brian and Gramps have been working on replacing the pipe since one in the afternoon, and as of 8:00pm they are still not done.

The original copper piping is 7/8" and to every one's conveinence they don't make that size anymore apparently because it can be found nowhere. So we have been trying to soder in a pipe that doesn't match the way it should.

Did I mention Brian caught his arm and the floor on fire with the blow torch. It was only for a second but it was pretty funny. Luckily no harm to anyone... so far.

I guess I will try and help them finish up. I am starving and was hoping to take Brian and Amy out to dinner. But Amy finally had to leave since she had chores to do and also has to work tomorrow morning.

Wish us luck and Amy, I'll try not to keep Brian here all night (but I can't guarantee he won't catch himself on fire again.)

Thanks for the help everybody!

Cake Finale

Tomorrow is the last cake class. Our challenge was to build a cake using some of the techniques we learned. Of course I have been watching too much television and decided that I did not want a plain old tiered cake. I decided to shoot for a cake that had a hat on top. My inspiration came from the boulder hats you see around St. Patrick's Day. We learned to make carnations (and yes everything is edible!) But I needed more then just that, so I found a way to make shamrocks too by taking the small heart cut outs and putting them together.

The class was very interesting and this is actually the first cake I have ever done (I know I look like a professional cake maker!! Don't I???) :) I was surprised because fondant is a lot like clay so it can be pretty easy to work with (but it picks up dust and fibers very easily which can be a pain). There is also gum paste, which hardens like a rock but is very fragile. This too is edible. The gum paste is like a stiffer clay that can be manipulated into a lot of shapes.

So here is my finale!!

Here is a close up of the carnations and shamrocks.

So that is the big finish to the class! It turned out even better then I hoped it could. The base of the cake and the hat are all made of actual cake just covered with fondant.