Calvin and Hobbes top Tammy Jo Gleckler’s award-winning cake, What Will You Do With Your Imagination?

Imagine this: You walk into the Tennessee Terrace concourse at Neyland Stadium in Knoxville greeted by long tables filled with children’s books and colorful, creative companion cakes! And then you know:  Reading really is in a sweet spot!

Cassie Pruitt’s cake Reading Is Fundamental: 2nd Place for All-Occasion Fondant, Intermediate Division

It’s all part of a major fundraiser for Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, a program that provides new books to children under the age of six in Knox County, Tennessee.  And with over 3,000 people in attendance, the net estimate of $25,000 by Mary Pom Claiborne (marketing director for Knox County Public Library) may be low since cakes, donated baked goods, and t-shirts were on sale, too. (Click here: News-Sentinel: Cake Bake a sweet event to benefit Imagination Library.)

Detail from Skyla Shealy’s cake Ladybug which took 2nd Place in All-Occasion Fondant, Junior Division

The main goal, of course, is to encourage reading at a young age, and, judging from the kids and grown-ups we saw, children (of all ages) were eager to dig into books as well as cupcakes, cookies, and cakes.

Year Shah’s Dr. Seuss: 3rd Place in All-Occasion Fondant, Beginner Division

We were also anxious to see what this year’s competition would bring since our blog post Books and Buttercream at The Great Cake Bake (Click here) nabbed the highest views of any post in 2013.  And, this year, we were definitely not disappointed.  In fact, if you had followed us around, you would have heard How’d they do that? multiple times since the mysteries of fondant, frosting, and flourishes escape us.  Here are our favorites, but who’s to say, right? Thank goodness we weren’t asked to judge.

Haley McManigal’s train loaded with books took 2nd Place in the All-Occasion Fondant category, Professional Division

Wedding Cakes

Ranging from average size to toweringly tall, wedding cakes were judged in two categories:  buttercream and fondant.

Chocolate on Amaretto Wedding Cake by Melissa Pendleton

Tammy Owenby, 1st Place Wedding Cake

Close-up, Tammy Owenby’s Wedding Cake

Fleur de lis base supports the tallest entry in the Wedding Cake category

All-Occasion Cakes

Cakes could be submitted in four categories:  Professional, Intermediate, Beginner, and Junior.

Detailed storybook characters populate the entry “Dr. Seuss” by Maria Pannala

Sarah Hicks’ entry The Hobbit took First Place in the Junior division.

Robin Middlebrook’s floral creation came in 1st in the Junior Division of All-Occasion Buttercream

Stacey Kolopus’s detail on her steam-punk themed cake merited 1st Place in the Beginner division of Fondant All-Occasion cakes.

We loved the characters on this Wonka cake by Whitney Roberson who was awarded 3rd Place in the Beginner Division for All-Occasion Fondant.

With so many people voting for Tammy Jo Geckler’s Calvin & Hobbes cake, we knew it would win, and it did: 1st Place, Intermediate Division, All-Occasion – Fondant.

Close-up of melting snowmen on Tammy Jo Geckler’s cake, What Will You Do With Your Imagination?

A dark background contrasts nicely with the figures on Julia Hammer’s entry “Granny’s Dragon”

Another popular cake was this UT Cornhole look-alike by Kathy Macourek!

Cupcakes

The tiniest creations in the show were submitted in the Cupcake category with these divisions:  Cake Pops, Intermediate, Beginner, and Junior

Hannah Southall’s entry entitled “Starbucks”

Winning 1st Place in the Junior Division was Rachel Hicks’ elephant cupcake

Donovan Scott created an almost look-alike llama to win 2nd Place, Junior Division for Cupcakes

Donovan Scott, proud winner of 2nd Place, Junior Division for his Llama Llama Red Pajama cupcake!

Debra Correa’s Catching Fire cupcake won 3rd Place, Intermediate Division

Diaper Cakes

A new category this year, Diaper Cakes, first involved supporters who donated $150.00 so that volunteers could create “cakes” out of diapers.  Yes, diapers.  After being carefully rolled and stacked to form “layer cakes,” diaper cakes were decorated based upon the theme of a beloved children’s book.

Little Owl’s Night

Zinnia’s Flower Garden

Good Night, Gorilla

Ladybug Girl and Bingo

All of Baby Nose to Toes

T-shirts were everywhere — on volunteers, Cake Bake attendees, etc. Parker Foppiano manned the table full of t-shirts (royal purple this year!) emblazoned with the Great Cake Bake logo.

Great t-shirts for a Great Cake Bake!

And baked goods were on sale for grown-ups who couldn’t pass up a bargain at the end of the day.  Like husband Bert who toted home cookies, oatmeal bread and a carrot cake at the insistence of long-time supporter of Friends of the Library, Bonnie Naugher.

Bert was easily persuaded by volunteer Bonnie Naugher to take home the goods at the end of the day!

Thanks to sponsors Sugarbakers and Food City and the many volunteers and Friends of the Library, the fifth annual Great Cake Bake is history — and a profitable one for a good cause, too.

Melissa Pendleton’s Green Eggs and Ham

If you missed this year’s Cake Bake, make a note for next year.  After all, who doesn’t like to have their cake and reading, too?

Close-up from Cassie Pruitt’s Reading Is Fundamental

For more information and pictures:

Check out my Pinterest Board: Fancy Cakes for pictures from The Great Cake Bake as well as other creative cakes I’ve found on the Web: http://www.pinterest.com/rushasams/fancy-cakes/

For the News-Sentinel article by Mike Blackerby “Cake Bake a sweet event to benefit Imagination Library,” click here.

For more on Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, click here.

For more on Friends of the Knox County Library, click here.

As bloggers, it’s only fitting that we look back at our most popular posts (listed below) and remind ourselves of the best places we have seen this year.  So, here are our best — followed by what we hope to see and share with you in 2014.

Most Clicked Posts of 2013

Number Three:

“Puhleeze” butter my biscuits in Knoxville at the International Biscuit Festival  — The lowly biscuit takes center stage at this springtime event receiving national attention.  Combine the one-ticket grazing privilege with booths of local vendors and a food writer’s conference, and you have a Knoxville hit that just keeps on growing!

Erin Donovan, Biscuit Festival Queen

Number Two:

Buttermilk Sky Pie Shop: New sweet shop in Bearden! — Lines are still long for this shop open only since November, and owners have converted one of their cupcake venues to a second shop just for pies!  Oh, my!

Owners Meredith and Scott Layton of Buttermilk Sky Pie Shop

Number One: 

Books and Buttercream at the Great Cake Bake — Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library is the beneficiary of this wildly popular fund raiser held each year at UT’s Neyland Stadium. The 2014 event (slated for February 22) has area bakers already thinking of what book-themed cake creations can top those of last year!

Alexander of Alexander’s Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Favorite Places of 2013

From The Bund in Shanghai to The Palouse in Eastern Washington, we’ve been fortunate to have traveled, looked, photographed, and sampled the goods in well-traveled and seldom-traveled places this year: a great life — and we’re grateful for it!  Here are some of our faves.

Looking Ahead to 2014

Although we have no definite plans for travel in the coming year, we have some ideas for what we’d like to see and share with readers.

• More shots of Idaho, perhaps some of the resorts we’ve missed and the coveted farmland of The Palouse in the snow! (Three more trips are in my future, thanks to work with Discovery Education.)
• Visits to places and events in Knoxville.  Since the top three visited posts have focused on our hometown, we “get it.”  So, look for coverage of what’s new and what’s most visited in and around our great city.
• Posts from our Viking River Cruise to Russia.  With the Olympics in Russia this year, look for our take on St. Petersburg and Moscow with points in between.
• Serendipitous posts — who knows where we’ll choose to go or what we’ll see.  But if we can work it in, our Bucket Short List includes Portland, Oregon, and maybe even Alaska.  Stay tuned.

Our wish for you, our readers, is for good health, happiness, and experiences that enrich your life, no matter where you travel!  Thanks to each and every one of you for making us part of your reading pleasure!

Happy New Year!

Happy Blogging Anniversary!

It’s hard to believe, but one year ago we launched Oh, the Places We See!  We had just rented an apartment downtown in our own city of Knoxville, Tennessee, and pretended to be tourists for a couple of weeks — even though we lived nearby in the suburbs.

The experience was rich:  We joined the urban walkers each morning prior to heading to work, we ate in new (to us) restaurants at night, and we were right on the spot for all the downtown Dogwood Arts Festival events.  So, the idea for a blog was born: Let’s share our adventures near and far with others.

Now, after a year later, we’re still writing about our travels — and here are the blogging stats that make us smile:

• 61 posts (a little more than one a week)
• 12,125 views (thanks to all our readers and commenters!)
• 76 followers (We really, really appreciate you!)
• Posts with the most views: Books and Buttercream at The Great Cake Bake and Upscale, Classy, Personable: Publix Opens in West Knoxville (Hmm.  We must love to eat around here!)

To celebrate, we’ve posted a picture of one of the tallest layer cakes we’ve ever seen!  It’s from Zoozacrackers Deli – a little restaurant at Wynn Las Vegas — where you can get a good burger or sandwich and watch your favorite sports on the big screens.

A special shout-out goes to Cynthia Moxley who’s commented the most.  Her encouragement means a lot, and her blog, The Blue Streak, is still the gold standard for us!  (Click here to read her posts about what’s happening in Knoxville!)

And what does the future hold?  Well, we’re gonna keep on travelin’ and writin’ — at least for now.  We’ve booked a trip for this summer (Viking River Cruise: Imperial Jewels of China). So keep coming back to compare adventures if you’ve already been or enjoy the new sites and sounds right along with us. As always, though, we love seeing what Knoxville has to offer — it’s home!

Thanks again for reading and following!  What a great year for blogging!

Rusha and Bert