Baby Shower Cake

This post is WAY overdue! I made this cake over a month ago and I'm just now getting around to posting the pictures. I guess since I haven't had any cakes lately it's good to spread my posts out a little!! That is how I am justifying my "blogging laziness" at least!

So I made this shower cake for one of my best friends, Kacey, who is having her 2nd baby boy in the next few days/weeks. We are waiting to hear how long it is going to be at this point! It was two-tiered with a fondant bow. The bottom tier was milk chocolate and the top tier was french vanilla. Both were covered in marshmallow fondant with fondant accents. I have attached her invitation because the cake was made to match it.

Owl Cake

This is a late post, but two weekends ago I made cakes! No sickness at all from them! I am waiting to get a picture from one of them, so I'll post on that one later. In the meantime, this is a cute owl cake that I did for a baby shower. The mommy has this on the baby's wall above the crib, so I made the cake to match.

The cake was french vanilla covered in milk chocolate buttercream icing.

I think owls must be trendy right now. I've done two owl cakes in the past 6 months. Plus, they had the cutest owl bedding at Target that my daughter picked out for her "big girl bed." We haven't made the transition yet, but it is soon to come. I'm sure that will make a blog post! Stay tuned for cake #2 from last weekend!!!

Fantastic Tutorial Results!!!

A great friend of mine took advantage of my lollipop tutorial and made a great first birthday cake for her sweet daughter, Ainsley Grey. She said that the tutorial was good and that making the lollipops was really easy! So you should try it out too. I was so excited to hear that someone actually used my tutorial and that the lollipops turned out so well! Here are pictures from the cute cake that Kim made!!! If anyone else makes fondant lollipops from my tutorial, please send me pictures and I will post yours as well!!!

                                     

                                    

                               Great job, Kim!!!

Lollipop Tutorial

I had a request for a post on how to make the lollipops from my lollipop cake.They were very easy to make and do not take too long at all! You'll want to make them about a week in advance so that they have time to harden completely and will stand up on top of your cake. I wish I had taken pictures of the process so that you could see each step.

1. You are going to make batches of fondant in each color that you want the lollipops to be. I use marshmallow fondant, but you can use regular fondant or store-bought fondant as well.

2. Once you have your fondant colored, you will take a good sized pinch (how's that for a southern girl's instructions!!) of the first color you want to start with. Simply roll it out into a thin string either using your hands or rolling it on a non-stick surface. This is similar to how we used to make snakes with play-doh! Make thin strings of each color that you want to use in the lollipop. Some of mine had 2 colors, some had 3.

3. Put each colored string together, pinching the top of the strings so that they will all stay together. You will then twist the strings so that the colors look intertwined. Once you have done this, you will only have one large string in your hand.

4. Put the large string on wax paper and start from the middle of the lollipop wrapping the string in a circle until you get to the outside. Use your hand to smooth the lollipop so that it looks flat.

5. The last step is to take a small brush and brush a small amount of water over each side of the lollipop. This will make the lollipop very sticky, but it will make sure that it stays together. Insert your sticks into the lollipops and leave them on wax paper for a few days so that they can dry and harden. I would flip mine to the opposite side every day to make sure that they don't stick to the wax paper.

Here is the picture of the cake again, so that you can see the finished lollipops.

Cake Break

Now for the BIG news! My husband and I are expecting our 2nd child in April, and ironically enough, the smell of cake and/or icing is making me really nauseated! I guess it is just that sweet, sweet smell that just isn't sitting well with this baby. I wish I had a picture of me working on my nephew's birthday cake. I put on one of those blue masks that cover your mouth and nose to do his cake. However, I could still smell the cake through the mask so I shoved a dryer sheet in there to block the smell! The dryer sheet was strong enough that I was able to finish the cake without getting sick. My mother-in-law called to "facetime" with me while I was working on the cake, and she didn't know what was going on when I first answered! Anyhow, after I finished the few weeks of cakes that I had already committed to, I decided that it was a good time to take a short "cake break." So for the next few weeks, until my nausea passes (let's hope it is only a few more weeks), I don't have any cakes. But hopefully I will be back in about a month, so check back to my blog then and see if I've updated!

Super Hero Cake

This was a fun one! This cake was for Alex's birthday and he started out wanting a Hulk cake, but then changed his mind and wanted ALL of his favorite super heros! We tossed around a few different ideas for this cake, and decided on a sheet cake with the super hero logos on top. This cake was french vanilla covered in buttercream.

Stroller Cake

This is another stroller cake for a baby boy shower. The colors were done to match the invitation: light blue, a darker shade of blue and brown. This cake was butter cake covered in buttercream.

Flip-Flops!

This cake was so much fun! I'm pretty sure that this one was dark chocolate fudge, but again, my memory is a little hazy because I did this a few weeks ago. It is covered in buttercream, but the thong and flower on the flip flop is fondant to make it stand off of the cake. And I put crumbled graham crackers around the edge of the cake to look like sand. I have posted the invitation for this party so you can see that I made the cake to match.

Lingerie Shower

I'm so sorry! I've been such a lazy blogger lately! I have done some cakes that I need to update you on! The first is a lingerie shower cake. This cake is a little risque! I ordered one like this from a professional baker a few years ago for a friend of mine, and I thought it was so cute that I wanted to copy it for this lingerie shower. The girl that the shower was being thrown for was described as "vintage-y," and the host wanted the cake done in a light shade of pink and mocha. I did this so long ago, that I can't even remember what flavor the cake was! Sorry! But it was covered in buttercream.

Baby Baptism

This cake was done for a sweet baby boy's baptism. His mommy has a large family, so this was a biggie! The bottom sheet cake was french vanilla and the cross was chocolate fudge. These seem to be the two most popular flavors of cake that I get asked for. The cake was covered in white buttercream icing. Mommy wanted his monogram and the date of the baptism on the cake. This is not the best picture because once again, I took it at night after I finished the cake and I used my cell phone to take the picture.

Sophie's Birthday

My favorite niece, Sophie, had her third birthday this weekend. My sister-in-law said that the only thing that mattered about the cake was that it was hot pink! So, hot pink it was! I did a round french vanilla cake covered in HOT PINK buttercream with white marshmallow fondant accents. Happy Birthday, Soapy (as my daughter calls her!!). I love you!

Canton Academy High School Reunion

The Canton Academy classes of 1992 and 1993 had a high school reunion this weekend and I was able to do a fun cake for them. We (the host of the party and I) decided to do a cake that looked like a yearbook, but put items on it that represented the school. This included their mascot, paw prints, etc. The cake was french vanilla covered in buttercream.

We represent... the lollipop guild!

That is the song that I was singing all night while I worked on this cake! A sweet one-year-old was having a lollipop themed party for her first birthday. The main cake was a two-tiered cake covered in lollipops and other fun accents. The bottom tier was chocolate fudge and the top tier was strawberry. The icing was buttercream. The lollipops, curly-cues and polka dots were all made of marshmallow fondant. These lollipops were so much fun to make. The colors of the fondant matched the colors that were on the invitation. Her smash cake was french vanilla covered in buttercream - made to look like a lollipop.

Fun Cakes!

A friend that I teach with asked me to do two cakes for him this past weekend... one for his son and one for his daughter. I asked what they wanted, because typically I do more complicated cakes, and he said chocolate cake with chocolate icing. Do you want it shaped like anything in particular? No. Do you want anything on it? Not sure. One day last week when his son and daughter were at school I got a chance to find out what they wanted. His little girl drew this cute picture of what she wanted her cake to look like.

His son said he just wanted it to say, "Happy Birthday, Logan" with purple and gold colors. He's an LSU fan, but don't blame him... it's his father's fault.

This is how the cakes turned out!

                             

I was certain that the kids were going to hate the cakes since they seemed so plain to me, but my friend's sweet daughter came to me at school and said that her smiley face cake was the BEST cake she had ever seen. She said that it was even better than the picture she had drawn :). I love kids... it is so easy to make them happy! Happy Birthday, Logan and Liza!

Firetruck Cake

This cake was done last weekend for Parker's third birthday party. I've been a little slow in posting all of my cakes since school has started!! The party was decorated so cute! There were these great fireman hats to wear and the party took a field trip to the local Fire Station! It was really great. The firetruck on this cake was french vanilla covered in fondant. The sheet cake was french vanilla and covered in buttercream. Yes, another black cake. There were little black mouths running all around this party! The accents on the sheet cake were fondant.

Book Cake

I did another retirement cake last weekend for one of the sweetest government teachers EVER!! I am really, really fond of Mrs. Renee and couldn't wait to do a cake for her in order to somewhat thank her for everything that she has done for our family!! The cake pales in comparison to her generosity, but it was a start to show my gratitude!!

This was another book cake since these seem to appeal to me when doing cakes for teachers. Probably because I like to read ... and this one was appropriate because Mrs. Renee and I share books! Since she was a government teacher, I decided that I should drape a flag over the book, in addition to the same classroom items that I put on the last retirement book cake. The cake was french vanilla (seems to be a favorite lately), the icing was buttercream, all of the accessories on the cake were marshmallow fondant.

I put all three pictures up because I wanted you to see all angles of this cake. Not like you care! But I would have been wondering what the other side looked like if it was me viewing these pictures for the first time!

Happy Retirement, Mrs. Renee! Enjoy yourself!
              

Four-Wheeler Cake

Last weekend I did a four-wheeler cake. This cake was so much fun! I really enjoyed it. I made a fondant four-wheeler and then decided to make it look like mud tracks through the middle of the cake. The rest I covered in grass and rocks. It was a real "boy" cake!!! The cake was french vanilla, icing was buttercream, four-wheeler and rocks were made of marshmallow fondant. Oh, and I threw in a little mud... only, kidding!

Minnie Mouse

I had a weekend full of birthdays! In addition to the 2 first birthdays that I posted about earlier, I also had a cake for sweet Sophie's second birthday! Just like all of the other 2 year olds in the world, she loves Minnie Mouse. So her mom and I worked together to come up with this cute design of Minnie.

Her ears were milk chocolate fudge and her face was french vanilla. Her bow and her nose was marshmallow fondant. You can't see this in the picture, but she had a marshmallow fondant edge all the way around her that matched the bow... pink with white polka dots. The rest of her face was covered in buttercream. Don't you just love Minnie Mouse? It was hard to keep myself from talking to her while I was making this cake :)

Slowing Down

During the summer, I got to where I was doing 3 or 4 (5,6...) cakes a week. I loved having the ability to do this while I was off. However, I go back to work again tomorrow, so I am going to slow down my cake making during the school year. Each cake takes time to make and bake, time to make the icing/fondant, and then usually 4+ hours to decorate. This takes a considerable amount of time away from my family, as you can imagine, so I am going to try to limit myself to one cake a week while I am teaching. I have a hard time saying "no," but I am going to try really hard to keep myself in check on this - for my sweet husband and precious daughter. Next May when school lets out I will go back to doing multiple cakes a week for the summer.

I am going to talk to my webmaster, Theresa (hehehe... she is going to loooove that!) about seeing if there is some type of calendar that I can put on the sidebar of my blog that will show what weeks I already have a cake booked. If you know how to do this leave a comment and let me know!! Thanks to all of you for all of the cake business this summer! It was so much fun making so many different types of cakes, and I continue to learn so much with each one! If you would like for me to do a cake for you during the school year, please make sure you talk to me about it in advance so that I can get you booked!

Whooooo's Turning One?!

Bad joke, I know. But I did a couple of very cute first birthday cakes for this weekend! And one of them had an owl theme. It is soooo cute! Sweet Blaise's mom is a graphic designer and made the cutest invitation for his first birthday party. I designed the main cake to match the owl on his invitation. The main cake was milk chocolate fudge covered in buttercream icing. I have attached the invite and the cake below. Let me know what you think!

This was the outfit that Blaise had to wear at his party. I designed his smash cake to match the bib. The smash cake was french vanilla covered in buttercream.

This was another first birthday cake and smash cake that I did this weekend. Both of these cakes were designed to match plates that were being used at the party. Both cakes were french vanilla covered in buttercream. Below are pictures of the plate and the cakes.