Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

Many, many (many, many, many) years ago, while I was getting my Master's Degree, I worked as a cake decorator.  It was a wonderful job - fast-paced, interesting, creative, and it gave me the instant gratification of seeing my accomplishments all laid out in the bakery case at the end of the day.

I had visions of starting a cake decorating business from home when my kids were little, but the health department had other ideas - no home-based food businesses allowed in my county.  So now I decorate to amuse myself and my family; the kids want to do their own cakes these days, so I just color the frosting and hand over the pastry bags.

Like any creative endeavor, however, it requires a lot of stuff, which is sitting in my (very) small amount of storage space, and gets pulled out every once in a while when needed.

A few years back, I made this cake for my mom's birthday (clearly, her hobby is woodworking...); everything on it is edible, and to jazz it up, I purchased supplies like sparkly powder for the buttons.

Fast forward to this week, when I made a card with sunflowers.  The centers looked a little dull, and I was hunting around for something to brighten them up - glitter was too shiny, and I couldn't think what else would work.  And then, thrifty gal that I am, I remembered the sparkly cake powder - perfect!

And now, the sunflower centers are not only sparkly, but edible....