Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Sweet Treat

This silly little confection may look pretty, but all you'd taste is fuzzy wool felt if you bit into it. I just finished making this today and I swear I still have a sugar high from creating such a sweet little cake-let.
The inspiration for this came from this incredible little Japanese craft book that I bought at a quilt show a few weeks back. My Mom, Adrian and I road trip to Chicago every spring for the International Quilt Festival. Along with the many wonderful quilt exhibits there is a massive shopping area that can best be described as mecca, Valhalla and heaven for anyone obsessed with all things fiber artsy. The show always lands near my birthday so I usually have a pocket full of birthday cash to spend on wonderful treasures. This year I came across a booth that nearly took my breath away. The company was called Sunfelt and the entire booth looked like a lilliputian patisserie. There were dainty plates of the most amazing felt confections every where you looked and the quirky young Japanese entrepreneurs who staffed the booth were delightful. I immediately purchased one of the books and a lofty stack of really fabulous wool felt. The book is written in Japanese, but it doesn't really matter because there's so many great pictures detailing each step. It's called 'Cakes Made of Felt' and is published by Ondori. The book is a great jumping off place for the ambitious craftster who doesn't like to follow directions that much anyway. I came up with my own pattern for the cake and sort of followed directions for the strawberries and cream puff. The berries I came up with on my own.
This little cake was so seriously flippin' fun to make that I wanted to do cartwheels, tap dance and sing the whole time I was stitching. It's a tiny little thing too, smaller than an average cupcake, maybe the size of a Hostess Hoho. I am going to have to make another one very soon because I didn't get to play with it nearly as much as I would have liked. As soon as I completed it, I packed it up and sent it off to my dearest, loveliest mama for Mother's Day. I hope she is as charmed by it as I am.