The Hunger Games - Catching Fire - Card & Cake

It was my good friend Shari's birthday very recently, and we were going to see The Huger Games- "Catching Fire", movie for her birthday, which is what inspired me to make her card and cake to match the theme ( even though circumstances have prevented us from seeing the movie, twice... which I still haven't seen yet!).

I used the humming bird from elements of style, embossed with gold on black card stock. For the ring I just cover enough black card stock with gold embossing to punch 1 1/4" circle + 1 3/4" circle.
The "Happy Birthday" is from Sassy Salutations, also embossed in gold.

I cut a sheet of white A4 copy paper in half and trimmed to fit inside the card , to resemble a book. I also pierced several hole in the centre and sewed some white cotton through it, again going for the book look, and having a few pages allows plenty of room for everyone to sign the card too.

I'm trying to show you a good shot of the flames.  this pictures showing how shiny they are as the crystal effects reflects the light.

To make the flames I used an Aqua Painter to paint a basic flame shape with gold shimmer powder on to a silicone mat.
Then I added a blob of Crystal Effects in a very basic crescent shape. Then I dipped a tooth pick into some Crystal Effects that I had added some Pumpkin Pie ink refill (to make it orange) and dragged the crescent blob of Crystal Effects into the shape of a flame, the more I dipped the tooth pick into the orange Crystal Effects, the deeper the colour of the flames become. I left them over night to dry, then peeled them of the silicone mat and arranged them on the card before sticking down with a two way glue pen. 

This is my mocking jay made of fondant icing that I coloured yellow and a little bit of orange.

This is with one coat of edible Antique Gold paint...

Two coats...

& Three coats.

I made a chocolate mud cake and covered it with dark chocolate ganache. I've never made ganache before and think next time I would prepare it earlier to allow it to set better.

I was really starting to run out of time at this point, but had managed to make flames for the cake too. I just cut the flame shapes out of fondant icing that I had added yellow & orange colour to, stuck them together, then painted a little bit of maple syrup on the top then sprinkled with red sugar.

Slapped the mocking jay on top and it was done (you can even see where my fingers hit the ganache  as I tried to carefully place the mocking jay into the centre of the cake).

 The Hunger Games Cake,  just in time for catching fire.

The gold looks different in different light.

Lemon Meringue Pie: November 2014
Wonder what will happen this year....