The Stained Glass Cake

My (oldest) brother is finally admitting that he has a birthday and as that he allowed to do something besides, dig fence posts (which was his original plan for the day), I have made a cake to celebrate. I had some trouble coming up with an idea for this cake, but since it was going to be the first one made in my new place with my new Kitchenaid mix master, I thought it should be something good. I decided to go with a stained glass kind of idea. It didn't turn out exactly how I would have liked, but the colors are vibrant and I think the idea pretty much gets across.
It is a yellow cake with a maple butter cream filling.

The Ketubah

OK, so I didn't have anything to do with the Ketubah, but it turned out so amazingly that I wanted to give it credit. The Ketubah is the Jewish marriage contract. They are traditionally written in Aramaic, which is one of those dead languages, and nobody really know what they say (but it is easier for the wife to get the husband to do the dishes by saying it says they have to in the Ketubah when nobody can read it to disagree). Anyway, my brother and his fiancee asked a close family friend of our's, who is a painter, to design and paint the Ketubah for them. Becca was delighted, though somewhat less so when they asked her to put on things like Kermit the Frog. She (luckily) ignored them, thinking their opinion of what is appropriate and desired on Ketubah might change over a few years of marriage. Below are the result of what she came up with, which I guess are designs copied from texts and images from the 13th and 14th centuries. I thought it was pretty cool, so I decided to post it up here with all my crafty stuff.


Becca, the artist (her name is really Rebecca Gray and I have a link to her website around here somewhere, I'll get it up when I can find it)


Unframed

Framed

The bride signing the Ketubah.

The Chupah

It's been a while since the last post, sorry about that. Mostly it's been because of the move and starting the new job, well that and not having done anything the least bit creative.

So, the Chupah... For those of you who don't know, a chupah is what people get married under in a traditional Jewish wedding. It is usually white and plain and provided by the synagogue or venue, but it can be whatever you want it to be really, as long as it has 4 poles and is completely covered (I think). So, my brother got engaged a bunch of months ago and asked me (or I might have volunteered) to make the chupah cover part since I'm handy with a needle. I, of course, agreed. Then about six months went by. Then it was about three weeks to the wedding and my dad had a weird fit involving lots of yelling and threatening if I didn't actually come over and sew. So, I went over and sewed. When they originally asked for this quilted chupah masterpiece, I asked what colors they wanted and they said blues, so they could use it in the bedroom apres la wedding. The wedding was in October though and with fall colors (i.e. my dress was orange), so I decided they were wrong and made it autumn-y instead. My mother (who is also has the curse of creativity) got a little chupah-feisty and chopped down pine saplings (they were going to go anyway, don't worry) and got my dad to pour cement into apple buckets (my poor father has actually be touched with the gift of being able to create the weird stuff my mother and I dream up) which she then filled with flowers. Then she stuck a stripped pine sapling into each one and we suspended the quilt from it. The following pictures are the visual aid for the potentially unclear description above...


I meant to take pictures during the sewing process, but forgot. Here is the setting up of the frame and poles.

Putting the quilt on the frame. (this involved flipping the frame upside down onto the quilt and me bossing people around a lot)


It's up!

Close up

With the bride and groom, rabbis and chupah-holders beneath it.
The whole shebang!