A 14-year-old girl was featured in the paper this morning along side of a cake she had decorated with a perfectly proportioned replica of the Eiffel tower done in pastillage and piped with royal icing. Her cake won first place last fall in the Oklahoma State Sugar Art and Grand National Wedding Cake competition in Tulsa. She had taught herself to decorate cakes by reading books and watching the Food Network. 

She also draws, quilts, bakes, takes pictures, paints ceramics, trains dogs, and does public speaking. This while maintaining an A average and taking part in lots of extracurricular activities at school. She wants to be a pediatric cardiothoracic surgeon.

When I was fourteen, I was president of the Mad Monsters Club; our bylaws included doing a bad turn at least once a day. When Sister Charles Mary got hold of a printed copy of the our bylaws, she had a fit in a nun-sorta-way. She told me I wasn’t living up to my potential. I told her that the bylaws were more of a parody than a governing document. She would have loved this cake decorator.

In case you’re wondering,  pastillage is sugar based edible dough.