Saturday

Onesie cookie favors for Baby English!

I've never met this Mommy to Be, but I know her sister very well. 


Her sister ordered these adorable little onesie cookie favors for Mommy-to-Be's baby shower this weekend!  



All 50 cookies were a bit different, some said "E" while other said "Baby" and others had just designs.  Dots and stripes and hearts...
Pink, blue, white, yellow and green pastel colors, as Baby E's gender is a surprise!



The cookie details:  sugar cookies with royal icing.

I hope they were fantastic and congratulations to the mommy to be!!



Ahoy, Matey!

Yo Ho Ho, Logan is celebrating his 5th birthday today! 
What better way to celebrate than with a pirate themed party and a pirate ship cake?!  

Here are the pics:


The pirate ship & plank....




      Arrrrgggg....ther'be treasure in these h're islands. 
 

 Happy Birthday Logan!  Your mom tells me that birthday celebrations are big events at your house - I hope this cake helped make your pirate party the best party yet!

Logan's cake details:
-10in square Signature Chocolate
-filling: raspberry preserves
-vanilla buttercream
-treasure chest with coins, pearls, rubies and pearl necklace - gumpaste
-pirate ship - hand formed from gumpaste with RKT base
-shark fin (not shown in pic) gumpaste







Sunday

Eee i eee i ohh - Happy 2nd Birthday Charlie!!

My little guy's birthday isn't officially for a few more days, but we decided to bring his cake to the huge family reunion today to celebrate.  One of C's favorite books these days Big Red Barn.  The family reunion was at my husband's cousin's llama farm - what a great opportunity to celebrate C's birthday with a Big Red Barn themed cake!

The bottom tier of C's cake was my signature chocolate fudge cake with cookie cream filling.  The top tier was my signature white cake with alternating layers of vanilla buttercream, raspberry and lemon curd.  Both were frosted with vanilla buttercream and accents (clouds, flowers, fence, sun) were made from fondant.  The animals were all hand made from gumpaste.

Here are the pics:

The front and back:
                                        
                                                  Gumpaste cow eating straw:

My lil Birthday Boy looking at his cake.  He was a bit grumpy in this pic since today was a 0-nap day (despite my best attempts).  However, shortly after this pic was taken when everyone sang Happy Birthday to Charlie, his whole face lit up and he had a smile from ear to ear...he was just in awe.  Best moment of the day, hands down!

                                                   Gumpaste lettering, hand molded:

                                                                   Top View:

                                                  the gumpaste horse in the gumpaste barn:

Gumpaste pig rolling in mud (chocolate): 

                                      This one is my fav and full of adorableness - gumpaste sheep:

                                  Gumpaste mommy duck and baby ducks quacking near a pond:


And, here are some pics taken today of my favorite little boy in this whole world.  Happy Birthday Charlie!  Your cake was quite an effort, but I'd do it again in a heartbeat!   My sweet little buddy....I still can't believe you're on the verge of turning TWO!   I love you!  xoxo



Monday

The beginings of a pirate ship cake

This cake is still about a two weeks from Birthday Party date, but gumpaste takes some time to dry.  These should be perfect by the party date!
Treasure chest with coins, a treasure map, pearls and rubies:

The cannon and cannon balls!




This pirate ship will be on water and the treasure chest will be on an island.   I also made a shark fin (you can sort of see it in the bottom middle of the photo) because sharks just seem to go well with pirate ships!

So excited about how these turned out and can't wait to see the final cake!!

The beginings of a farm cake....

I've had lots of requests to post photos of the gumpaste farm animals that I've been working on lately.  Hopefully a rooster and chicken will join these adorable little guys (if time permits).

These all started from a block of white gumpaste which I colored and hand molded.   The piggy will be rolling mud (chocolate) on the cake....can't do that until day-of.  This cake will likely be three tiers when completed. 







Saturday

Flavors and Fillings; Signature Cakes

Cake Flavors:
    Signature Chocolate Cake
    Signature White Cake (white almond sour cream)
    Lemon
    Lemon Poppy Seed
    Carrot (with raisins, nuts, coconut)
    Spice 
    Raspberry Swirl – Signature White Cake batter swirled with raspberry preserves
    Coconut
    Marble
    Red Velvet
    Banana
    Swirley Whirley (white  w/ blue, red or green swirls)
    Have something else in mind?  Just ask.

Cake Fillings:                           
    Cookie Cream             
    Cannoli Cream        
    Vanilla Buttercream                     
    Buttercream -  various flavors
    Lemon Curd                                 
    Strawberry Preserves
    Peanut Butter Mousse
    Coconut
    Raspberry Preserves
    Chocolate Hazelnut
    Mocha Mascarpone

Buttercream  Flavors:
   Vanilla
    Chocolate
    Lemon
    Orange
    Mocha
    Coconut                        
    Almond

Other Frostings:
Chocolate Ganache

Signature Cakes:
SWEET BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION - Signature Chocolate or Signature White Cake, filled and frosted with Vanilla buttercream.

CANNOLI CAKE – Layers of cannoli filling sandwiched between Signature Chocolate or Signature White Cake, frosted with vanilla buttercream.

COOKIES-N-CREAM – Signature Chocolate or Signature White Cake, filled with Cookie Cream.  The filling in this cake tastes like an Oreo cookie!

DEATH BY CHOCOLATESignature Chocolate  cake layered with chocolate Buttercream.

LEMON RASPBERRY DREAMSignature White cake with alternating layers of Lemon Curd and Raspberry preserves, frosted with Vanilla Buttercream

TUXEDO CAKEalternating layers of Signature white and Signature Chocolate cake, sandwiched between Chocolate Buttercream. 

NAKED CAKEthis cake is unique and non-traditional.  The cake layers are filled and the cake top is frosted, but the sides are unfrosted. (see photo above)

CHOCOLATE STOUT CAKE – Chocolate stout cake layered with mocha mascarpone and drenched in chocolate ganache

Sunday

Congrats Melissa! Pregnant momma topper shower cake.

This cake was made for a very dear friend of mine.  Melissa and I were pregnant at the same time in 2009 and our toddlers are now about 3 months apart.  Melissa is now pregnant with baby #2 and due in just a few weeks.  I wanted to make her a special baby cake to celebrate and surprised her last week with one.

Now, before I get to any pics of this cake, a quick (and necessary, I must add) background story.....    I wanted to do something different for Melissa's cake.  My signature baby cake is a sleeping little baby with its little butt up in the air...she's seen this one before.  So, I decided to try to re-create one of the Pink Cake Box cakes that are so fantastically adorable.  I started the topper for this cake after a work party at about 9:30pm.  I made the torso (chest and pregnant belly) and then wrapped a different color gumpaste around it for a cute little maternity shirt.  Well.....when I wrapped the shirt around, the belly somehow got a bit smushed and the chest ended up sticking out.  Now, since it was about 11:30pm when I put this little figure up in the cabinet to dry, I somehow (!?!?!) failed to notice this. 

In the AM, my hubby opened the cabinet to get some cereal and started laughing hysterically. Realizing he was looking strait at the pregnant lady cake topper I'd made the night before, I panicked and  cornered him, demanding to know what was so funny.  His response "I just didn't expect to see a pregnant gumpaste lady when I was getting my Cheerios."  I looked at the figure at that moment and all of a sudden thought - HOLY MOLY, her chest quadrupled overnight! 

Realizing that he might have been laughing about the gigantic chest on the Melissa look-a-like pregnant gumpaste woman in the cabinet, I grilled him about whether they were too big.  "Too big?"  he said, "well, they are a bit large, but who says that's too big."  "Even if they are a bit big, she'll find it hilarious and she could probably use a good laugh."  Knowing I didn't have time to re-create the gum paste woman and knowing he was probably right and she'd probably get quite a laugh out of this, I decided to give the it a go...Melissa was getting a cute, though busty, topper on her cake.  I crossed my fingers and hoped she'd find it as amusing as we'd started to....

Well, Melissa did get a good laugh out of this cake (as did everyone).  More importantly, the flavor combination turned out wonderfully and the cake was absolutely delish!  AND most importantly - she loved it!

With the background story and explanation out of the way, here are the pics:
The bow was made from fondant, as were the dots.   I made the dots pink and blue and yellow, as Melissa and her hubby decided to have the sex of this baby be a surprise. 
(Though I'm convinced that she's carrying a baby boy.)

Here is a close-up:

This cake was my signature white cake layered with lemon curd, buttercream and raspberry fillings.  The frosting was vanilla buttercream. 

And of course, one last picture.  Here is Melissa with her cake.  Isn't she adorable!?!