You Are My Sunshine

I had fun matching this cake to the invitations. :)  This cake was lemonade flavored to match the super cute "Sunshine & Lemonade" theme Emily's mom worked so hard to achieve.  I wish I had pics of all the amazing decorations from the party to share with all of you.  Precious. 

 

Paintball Cake

This summer I had an opportunity to make a paintball cake for a young man's 12th birthday.  His mom had some ideas in terms of design, and had one very specific request, she wanted the inside to be camouflaged.  Oooohhhh...that sounds fun.  Here's how I managed to do that.  First things first, bake the cake.  I had to make three batches of cake batter.  Two of the batches were WASC, I just colored one of the olive green, and the third was a chocolate flavor. 

Once the batter was made I had to alternate the batters into the cake pans until all were used and full. 

 

Ready for the oven.

Baked & Leveled.  How cool did they turn out?!?!  I know I was excited!

 

To finish off the cake, I iced in in plain white buttercream, made a target and covered it in "paintball" gumballs.  I was super excited about the final product!  Here it is.  Whatcha think??

 

 



 

 

Super Fun Skittles Cake

In early September I was asked by a friend to make a cake for her daughter's 16th birthday.  Sarah had shown her mom a picture of a cake that looked like a bag of skittles.  I was too excited!  This was going to be a fun one!  Here's how I did it. 

First thing you ask when someone asks for a cake is what flavor?  Her answer..."Skittles Flavor"  Ummm...okey dokey...So what I decided to do was to bake a strawberry cake, and cover it in lemon flavored icing.  YUM!!

Here is the cake.  I rounded the edges and ripped of the corner.

Then I covered it in icing: 

I let that chill for a while.  In the meantime I was rolling out my red fondant to make the bag.  Here it is covered.  I scalloped the edges just like the real bag.

The next part made me REALLY nervous.  I had to make the letter for the name, but I really wanted to make it as perfect as possible.  I made sure to have the real bag close by for reference.

Then I added the rainbow at the top.  What a pain this was, and I still am not completely satisfied with the result, but it was as good as it was going to get.

Originally I was going to use real skittles for the bag and for the candies that were to be spilling out of the bag.  Then my husband suggested that that would look dumb.  Gotta love him, but he was right, so I made them from fondant.  Here's the result:

 

In the end, I had tons of fun with this one.  And Sarah loved it.  She and her friends couldn't believe that it actually tasted like skittles!!  Yay!!





 

Ugly Firetruck

So sometimes you take on a job (or in this case I volunteered for a job) that reminds you that you still have a learn. Yikes! At least the birthday boy and his 3 year old friends liked it. :/ I think, had I used fondant, and given myself a bit more time, it would have turned out so much better!

Valentines Day Cake Ideas

Here are a few ideas for easy valentine cakes and cupcakes: The first were some cupcakes that I had bakes for my daughters class, last minute as usual, so easy was a MUST!
I made this cake quite a few years ago. I really just wanted to practice my basket weaving. :)
I saw a picture of one like this somewhere and though I'd gie it a try. The same size heart cutter is key but it can get to be a bit tricky trying to get the all to fit together just right.

Rainbow Wedding Cake

Last summer my mother-in-law, and her partner , took a trip to Cape Cod and were wed. They had a reception planned for October to celebrate here at home with their family and friends. Of course, I signed up to make the cake, and much to my delight, I was given free reign on the design of the cake. I wasn't sure if I needed to go traditional, in design, or something completely off the wall, after all the reception was a 70's themed costume party. :) But what I did know is I wanted to completely surprise them, and I knew I needed to incorporate the rainbow in somehow. Here's what I ended up with: A four tier (4 in, 6in, 8in, 10in) covered in buttercream, decorated with fondant circles.

I think they really like the cake. But maybe weren't so blown away with the "traditional" wedding cake appearance. Although, I did try do go more mod in design, it did look very traditional. They were happy, but not blown away.............yet. :) Here's what I did to knock their socks off............

Here are only four of the 24 layers of cake I baked for this cake. 4 tiers, 6 layers per tier.

Leveling....


Each tier got filled with my traditional buttercream icing, all 6 layers. Then crumb coated.Each tier got filled with my traditional buttercream icing, all 6 layers. Then crumb coated.

After icing and smoothing, the buttercream, I attached fondant circles to the out side of each tier.

The fondant circles were dried, sprayed with shimmer, and cut in various sizes. Here is a close up of circles:

Random pattern:

Tiers waiting to be stacked:

My husband and I were the only ones who knew what the inside looked like, and I was like a little kid trying to hold it in, because I knew how much they were going to like it. And lets face it, I do this to see the look on the faces of the recipients, it makes me feel good to see how excited someone can get over a cake that you have made for them. But alas, I had to wait, and wait, and wait.....

Finally, it was time to cut the cake. YAY!!! Here's is what they saw first...OMGeeee.

What one whole tier looked like cut...........

And what each piece looked like!

The ladies were thrilled, soooo very excited, and blown away but what I had made for them. Congratulations Mom and Missy Vet. We love y'all !