Saturday 1 November 2014

Superheroes, assemble!

In our house, we are all a bit too familiar with superheroes. Though most of us (Husband being the nerdy exception) knew a small amount of well-known characters from movies and cartoons (Spiderman, Batman, Superman, Hulk, etc), it wasn't really until we bought the xbox game "LEGO Marvel Superheroes" that characters' names, outfits, and skills were enjoyed and memorised by our 4 year old, who is currently obsessed with the game.

He was certainly a great go-to boy when I needed help with various heroes and villains for Ben's birthday party a few months ago!


Last Halloween was the debut of Husband dressing up in his favourite comic character's costume (Deadpool), when he paraded around the streets with Nerf guns, fake swords, and our three children, in search of chocolates and lollies.

The excitement and freedom of acting like someone else, meant that the journey didn't stop there. Since that night, there was some costume upgrades and character adjustments to prepare for the second public appearance at Supanova earlier this year.

But wait! There's more.

More upgrades, more eBay purchases, more spray painting, more air brushing, and more excitement when Husband's boss saw an ad on TV for something called "Superhero Week", which is a fundraising appeal for Bear Cottage, encouraging people to raise money while dressing up (there'll be a post about that later).

But, the day for going into work dressed as Deadpool came for Husband, and it was a day that none of us will ever forget! See, it turns out that fake weapons, plastic guns, and a spandex 'unitard' weren't appreciated on Sydney's City Rail that morning, the police got called, and Husband got arrested.

Early that morning, before that happened, I'd woken up early with Husband to help him with his attire, and to make the final touches on some cupcakes that he'd asked me to make for him to take to work and give to those who had donated money to Bear Cottage (one of the fund raising targets that he hit involved him handing out cupcakes... in a pinafore).

Using melted chocolate and superhero logos that I'd printed out, I made 4 different cupcakes. I was pretty happy with them, although I'd made Spiderman mostly blue because the Deadpool ones were already red (and I'm weird like that).



But... No-one cared about my cupcakes that day.

If it weren't for the cupcakes, however, I'm told the headlines would not have read that he was armed with "high calorie baked treats", and would have been more along the lines of a crazy terrorism attack, or an escaped psych patient on the loose with fake weapons, wearing a spandex outfit. The next fundraising goal would have quickly switched to bail money!


Since that unforgettable day, though, my cupcakes have been upgraded, too. There's been a few more times that I've been asked to make these famous "superhero" cupcakes, and I've been slowly adding to my superhero cupcake repertoire.


I will admit that I'm pretty disappointed there's no orange or purple superheroes! These additions, alterations, and practice cupcakes have all led to the climax of today's version, which included Superman - the fondant cape edition!


There may now be no stopping me from adding fondant capes to all superhero cupcakes from now!


But then when I think about superheroes and capes...
I can't help but think of this: