It's a tooth...well, I tried...

My mom is a great cook, don't ever let her tell you otherwise. Between tuna casserole, green pizza crusts on St. Patrick's Day, and that one time we ever ate meat loaf, I did not have a culinarily deprived childhood.

However...since I met Nathan, I have learned the value of festive and decorative foods. My mother-in-law, Pam, is the queen of making the right food for the right occasion, even if it is just switching jello colors to match the season.

The first Christmas Nathan and I dated, I learned about cornflake wreaths. My life has never been the same.

It's not a complicated recipe at all...but I think it might be family secret. Suffice it to say it involves a lot of cornflakes, a lot of marshmallows and food coloring...but not too much.

The second year Nathan and I were dating I made a cornflake wreath for my family. They all became believers, too, especially Elizabeth.

It is only this year that I am beginning to understand and explore the vast world of cornflake art beyond the Christmas wreath. This year I experienced the cornflake Valentine heart, the cornflake shamrock, and the cornflake "50" in honor of my mother's fiftieth birthday. (I was advised by my father-in-law, Craig, however, that it included bran flakes because, in his words, "she's fifty now, after all." Really it was just because they didn't have enough corn flakes.

Almost universally, these confections are tinged with green food coloring, the only exception I've ever seen is the Valentine heart and that was consumed before I got too close a look at it.

Well, Elizabeth has been having a lousy week, and seeing as it's only Tuesday, I thought I needed to do something to cheer her up. So, I obtained the requisite cornflakes, marshmallows, and food coloring. In honor of her first semester of dental school, which will be starting this August, I attempted to create a blue cornflake tooth. Blue because I thought red would look bloody, green would look gangrenous, and yellow doesn't really show up.

I think it turned out much more like an "M" than a tooth, but Elizabeth says she saw the tooth, and I guess that's all that matters. It's kind of hard to see in this picture...sorry.