Ahhhhh.............Certification! Where to start????
How about 2 years ago when I signed up for the test (to be taken this past August at the ICES Convention in Lexington KY). I previously posted about Certification, you can read it here:
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So, in the previously link post, I said I would update everyone on my preparations, etc.... Obviously I didn't. Part of it is because I am lazy and haven't blogged like I should be, the other part is because there's a very good chance some of the adjudicators could have ended up reading my blog (yes...it was mostly due to laziness, lol).
So, you'd think with two years to plan and prepare that it would have been a breeze, right? Had I spent two years preparing it might have been! I, however, have learned that life changes drastically in two years - sometimes in ways you never could have imagined. When I signed up, I was working part-time (though hopeful for full-time employment) and hadn't yet met Wolf (there's a blog post somewhere about him, I think). So, I had all the time in the world to do anything I wanted! Well.....in the two years since signing up, I am employed full-time (and then some!) and have been spending every weekend with Wolf (which doesn't seem like enough time sometimes).
Needless to say...combine all that with my penchant for procrastination and you get about 4 weeks time to prepare for Certification. I know....I know....what can I say? So, in that 4wk time span I had the following that needed to be accomplished: order dummies, cover two dummies in fondant, make gumpaste flowers [roses (3), rosebuds (3), sweet peas (25), rose leaves (30) and rose petals (31)], flood 6 collars (3 top, 3 bottom), flood 12 side panels, pack certification stuff, pack the car, etc....
I managed to get all the flowers and flower parts made, as well as ordering the dummies, first. Unfortunately, there are no pictures of the sweet peas or the rose leaves.....these were finished in KY days before Certification. Here are what the roses and rosebuds looked like:
Next I focused on getting my collars and panels flooded and drying....since they need to be stable enough to withstand the drive to KY. I made the icing and flooded the collars and panels in the span of two days (approx. 8 days before leaving). This should have been PLENTY of time for them to dry before driving. I did them on a Thursday and Friday. On Monday, I checked the collars....and they were soft....like marshmallow almost! You can see the finger marks I put in them....without much resistance at all.
The oddest thing were the ripples I saw in the collars, and some of them had liquid 'oozing' out from the collar! I had never seen anything like this before and couldn't imagine what caused it. They had purposely been in a closed air conditioned room for 4 days - they should not have been this wet!
So, I called MJ, the RI expert that I know, to ask her opinion on what happened. At this point, if the collars and panels couldn't be done and dried for KY, there was no point in bringing anything else for Certification. Through a discussion, we determined that the likely cause of my problems was too much liquid in the royal icing that I made. I thought about it afterwards, and realized I had used liquid egg whites to make my royal icing...not real egg whites. While this might not normally be a problem, I probably needed to use more powdered sugar than my recipe(s) call for. So, I through all the collars and panels out (they were no good), re-made the royal icing with real egg whites, and re-flooded the collars. Checked them the next day and they were already drier than the previous ones had been (I tested the test puddles after all). So, I piped the panels over two days, and could only do 8 of the 12...my hands simply wouldn't pipe anymore. So, my collars and panels were re-piped only 2-3 days before needing to drive with them!
I, fortunately, was packing/organizing my tools and stuff for Certification as I went along at home, so I didn't need to spend an entire night packing. I managed to fit the packing in every night. By Thursday night, everything in the house was packed, all I needed to do was pack the car when I got home from work on Friday (we were leaving Saturday morning).
To add to all this...my car needed a new engine and took 4 weeks to get done! I picked it up the Monday (5 days!) before leaving for Certification - so I was a little stressed about that too. I got in the car to go to work on Friday morning and the brake light was on. Great! Just what I need the day before I'm leaving for a 2k mile road trip! So, when I got to work I called the guy that did the engine work and told him what was going on. He said to bring it in and he'd take a look at it right away. So, I explained to my boss what was going on and left. Fortunately, it was just a brake caliper that was bad. He had it fixed and I was out of there in an hour! Yay! and it wasn't expensive! Double Yay!
The rest of the packing and the drive down went fine, with few issues. Since there were three of us in the car, plus my Certification stuff, plus our luggage, I had to use the Cargo Carrier I have for my car (it goes into a receiver hitch). Now, I'm sure the car was WAY overloaded! Once we got all the luggage on the carrier, it was pretty low to the ground, and we scraped the ground pulling into Cracker Barrel for breakfast. Slightly concerned that this might become an issue, we stopped at a Home Depot in Pennsylvania (it took me a while to figure out what to do about the carrier hanging so low) and purchased additional cargo straps and literally tied the carrier to the roof rack, I'm sure we were a sight to see on the highway!
Not sure why it looks un-level....it was level before we drove off with it.
So, we made it Kentucky Sunday by dinnertime and had the car unloaded and one packed hotel room!
So.......you're probably wondering how Certification went, huh?? After all...that's probably why you're reading this post!
I will start by saying it was one of the most stressful things I've ever done. For someone who keeps as much stress out of her life as possible, it was almost my undoing. I am proud that I didn't quit, and that I finished the day with three pieces to present to the adjudicators. Sadly, not all those pieces were finished. However, only the adjudicators and I could tell.
The day started off ok, but things started not cooperating pretty quickly. When they didn't cooperate, I put them aside and started on something else. This worked for a little while...until I had to go back to what wasn't working out. One thing that was nice, and helped my ego a little.......while I was piping the lattice work for my nirvana panels I overheard one of the adjudicators say to another to look at how I was piping my lattice work - it was overlapping my flooding area. At first I thought 'Oh crap...they're not going to like that'. Then heard her say it was brilliant!!!! That it made a stronger bond with the flooding. YAY!!!!!!! That was just what I needed to hear at that moment in time!!! I was also told later, by many of the adjudicators, that my lattice work looked like solid from far away.
At one point, the stress go to me, and I lost it when a coupler ring wouldn't unscrew for me. I could feel the tears welling up, so I handed it to my assistant and asked her to take it off, and went off to the bathroom, telling her I'd be right back. I didn't make it out of the Certification room before the tears started in earnest. I walked in the bathroom and couldn't stop crying. Fortunately, one of the adjudicators and the test administrator came in after me (I also consider them both friends, as I know them personally). They hugged me and calmed me down and made me feel better. Before they came in, I considered walking out the opposite side of the bathroom and not coming back - and I'm not a quitter. So, I composed myself and went back and just started doing whatever I could to make things look like they were getting finished.
One of the adjudicators had recently completed her first Tri-Athlon (swimming, running, biking). Even though she and her wonderful husband finished hours after everyone else did - they never gave up, no matter what. I know her personally and am proud of her for not giving up. I kept telling myself that if she could finish the tri-Athlon then I could finish the Certification test. She didn't give up when she wanted to, and neither was I! I don't like to name people in my blog in case they don't want to be, but if you know anything about ICES and cake decorators, you can figure out who she is!
I started assembling my Nirvana collars and panels. I first collar I picked up ended up shattering in my hand (after flipping it over and piping icing on it, and flipping it back)...just as I was about to set it on the cake. I saw one of the adjudicators (who had been watching me) just turn and walk away - it kind of made me chuckle a little...I'd have done the same! The second collar when on fine, as did the panels. One panel fell and broke and I almost freaked out because I only had 2 extra. But the rest went on fine.....except for a large (to me) gap in the back where the panels were supposed to meet. I ignored it for the time being and put the top collar on (no issues - yay!), and figured I'd deal with it later. I dealt with it by piped a big shell over the open space, as opposed to the small, dainty ones I piped around the rest of the panels.
During the lunch break I knew I was way behind and would have to start ditching some of the 'extra' things I was going to do. I cut a bunch of things out and felt ok going back after lunch. I didn't ask how much time was left, and couldn't see the countdown clock (I had my contacts out). I was about to ask when they announced 1.5hrs left. Holy crap! I looked around and I had WAY more than 1.5hrs of work left!! Instead of panicking, I realized I wasn't going to finish and had to decide what wasn't getting done. I quickly made a rose and sweet pea (in under 5 min I think!) so that I could put my dried ones from home on the display. I dusted some roses and sweet peas and put 1 rose and 5 sweet peas on the display. I tried to finish my oriental stringwork, but couldn't get the last set of dots to adhere to pipe the last (4th) set of strings. So, I said oh well and fixed what I could.
Here are the final pieces I ended up with:
As seen in the Cake Room at Convention
Close-up of my rose and sweet peas
Close-up of my buttercream cake
Close-up of Oriental Stringwork
Close-up of Nirvana collars/panel
Close-up of embroidered butterflies (6) and Nirvana panel
I ended up not starting one of my skills, and not finished two others. The adjudicators did score what I finished (and even some of what I didn't) and had I been able to finish, I'm confident I'd have achieved CSA status. Will I do it again? I really don't know. I did this for me, no one else. I know if I put the time into preparing for it that I can do it. Two years is a long time to sign up ahead of time for something - life can change so much in two years. Two years ago when I signed up my heart was 100% in it.....a year ago maybe 75%.....6 months ago maybe 50%. Rather than throw away the opportunity I gave it all I could at this time. If I ever decide to do it again, I'd sign up at the 1 year mark and if there's space then it was meant to be.
~Chelle
