Bridal Shower Monogram Cake

For this bridal shower cake, the bride's sister wanted to incorporate the wedding colors and the initials of the bride and groom. She described the blue color as "indigo blue", and I wasn't too sure about the shade (I used "navy blue" food color and "sapphire blue" luster dust!) I figured it was a dark blue, almost to a purple, and I was so relieved when the hostess said that the color was perfect! Phew. The blue bow, ribbon and logo were all made from fondant. The logo was actually inspired by the "Ethan Allen" logo, which happen to be the couple's initials (another suggestion from the hostess). I carved the initials into blue fondant with sculpting tools, then let the piece dry so that it would stand on top of the cake (with the help of a popsicle stick). The cake was white cake with Bavarian cream and raspberry filling, covered in white butter cream. Hope the shower was a big success!

More Toy Story Cupcakes

These cupcakes were for a Toy Story fanatic who was turning 3. I created all the characters out of fondant this time, a variation from the last batch of Toy Story cupcakes I made that were more 3D and had chocolate details. These were a little more artsy since I drew all the faces by hand with edible markers. I was happy with the end result...still recognizable and I got to try the human-type faces of Buzz, Woody and Jessy. Along with the cupcakes, I made a 4" personal size cake for the birthday boy. In her infinite wisdom, Mom decided to put all the characters on the birthday boy's cake (could you imagine if his friends got Rex and Hamm and he didn't? Good thinking, Mom) The cupcakes were chocolate chocolate chip, lemon and pumpkin spice. What a fun project! No wonder these guys are so popular!

Twilight Cupcakes

I admit that I have not yet read the Twilight series. My sister-in-law loaned me the books over a year ago, and somehow I don't have time to read. ;) So how about making book-themed cupcakes instead? These were for a birthday celebration / bunco party with a Twilight theme. I made a dozen (what else) red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese icing, then topped them with lips molded in red chocolate. I then piped on fangs in butter cream. The other dozen vanilla cupcakes I made into red apples by rolling the tops in red sugar and adding a Tootsie Roll stem. I finished them off by piping a reflection in white butter cream icing. Makes me want to read...or eat a cupcake.

Tennis Birthday Cupcakes

I should have snapped some photos of the room at this party because it was so adorable! These cupcakes were for a 70th birthday for a lady who still loves to play tennis (you go, girl!) The cupcakes were coconut cream cake with vanilla butter cream and peanut butter cake with chocolate butter cream (my 2 favorites! too bad there weren't any leftovers this time) For the tennis balls, turns out it's hard to find chartreuse sugar, so I made my own by mixing yellow and green sugar in a bowl. I iced the cupcakes, then rolled the tops in my sugar mixture. Then I piped the white lines on top to finish them off. For the tennis rackets, I sprinkled the chocolate frosting with green and yellow non-pareils, then I molded chocolates using green, yellow and white candy melts. Once the candies were set, I popped them on top of the chocolate butter cream. Then I got to deliver these to the party and set them up on my dad's custom cupcake tower. To dress up the tower, I molded some chocolate number picks and added them to a couple cupcakes at the top of the tower. Then, I had an extra fondant banner from a cake this weekend, so I wrote the theme of the party, "Grand Slam!" with my green food writer marker. It was really a cute centerpiece to an already cute party!

Monster Truck Cookies

These "monster" cookies were party favors for a 5th birthday. The sugar cookies got a blue frosting glaze, then I attached black fondant wheels to the wet frosting. Once they were dry, I piped the white detailing with royal icing and added some silver highlights with luster dust.

Beach Party Cookies

These cookies were for a beach birthday party. I had tried in the past to add sanding sugar to my glazed cookies and was unsuccessful (turns out if you sprinkle it on top of wet icing glaze, the sugar actually sinks in and it looks really weird!) So I was excited to discover this technique for sugaring the tops. Once the glaze dried, I "painted" the area I wanted to sugar with water and sprinkled the sugar on top, shaking off the excess. (The water acted like a sugar glue once it mixed with the icing glaze. Cool!) So the sand castles got some white sugar highlights, the sand pails got a stripe of red sugar and some blue sugar to show the inside of the buckets, and the beach balls got stripes in 4 colors of sugar. They turned out super cute, and I loved the sparkle! I finished off the buckets and balls with some royal icing highlights and voila! Beach party fun!

Jungle Sports Baby Shower Cake

So it's been a while since I've had an audience for cake decorating, but I actually had some girlfriends over while I started this one, so it was kind of fun. Maybe I should do a full tiered cake class?! Anyways, this cake was a fun idea...it was based of the soon-to-be parents' baby registry which included this pattern called "Team Safari" for their bedding and nursery items. All the animals were featured with various sports balls, as I replicated in fondant. The cakes were vanilla cake, one with chocolate butter cream frosting & filling, and the other with strawberry butter cream frosting and filling. I was proud of myself for thinking of the strawberry butter cream...I whipped it up on the fly, and it was pretty tasty. It passed my quality control board (i.e. husband and daughter) with flying colors. The cakes were decorated in fondant animals, including the hand-molded fondant elephant and the palm fronds. I finished off the cake by piping a chocolate icing border and some vines. I put the "welcome" to the baby on little pennants at the top of the cake, which I thought was fun and very "boy". Congratulations! Hope you have a smooth delivery! ;)