Caines-Pearl Wedding

What a joy and honor to get asked to make the wedding cakes for my neighbor.

I made their engagement cake and they liked that so much, that Lauren wanted to have me for her wedding and groom's cakes also.

Here are the ribbon roses after they were placed on the cake at the reception hall. These are made of pink fondant and then brushed with pink and super pearl petal dusts to give them dimension and shine. These were a lot of fun to make, each one has it's own shape and "personality". Here is the cake put together. This thing was heavy! I put two tiers together before I got to the hall and then finished assembly and cornelli lace piping there. Placing the edible pearls around the bottom of each tier was quite time consuming, but I think the overall effect was lovely.

Once it was all put together I needed help to move it onto the cake plateau in the center of the table.

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This is the triple chocolate groom's cake. It is covered in yummy delicious chocolate buttercream and also has the cornelli lace pattern to coordinate with the bridal cake. This is a replica of their engagement cake.

It is a sweet and personal message on the cake. "Grace is a treasure, a Pearl of great price."
Lauren's middle name is Grace ~ and she is definitely a treasure.
The groom's last name is Pearl ~ and what a nice way to honor the value of their relationship and newly shared name.

I wish the Pearls a lifetime of love and happiness! Thanks for letting me share your special day with you.

Pokemon Birthday

As promised, here is the Pokemon cake that I made for my son's birthday party at the local fun park. I have several views of the cake because I made several of his favorite Pokemon characters. I also made this a three layer cake because I knew the characters would be big....so this cake (without the ball) stands over 6 inches high!This is the "front" view of the cake. I put Pikachu in front because I think he is the most recognizable Pokemon. He belongs to Ash and everyone knows that Ash is the best trainer!

(I don't really know what I'm talking about, but it sounds good doesn't it?)

Anyway.....the Pokeball on top of the cake is made from chocolate.

I have the Wilton ball pan set and I used it to make a white chocolate half and a red chocolate half.

Then I sealed those together with white chocolate and then I used black chocolate to make the band. (If I would do this cake again....I think I would make black modeling chocolate to make a "cleaner" looking band) then I used a solid melting wafer for the button and drew the circle inside that with an edible marker.

I hope I explained this well enough....I really should take some step by step for cool items like these....action shots!

The name and lightning bolts are made from chocolate. I found a Pokemon font on the internet and used that as a template.

Okay now it's time to play.......Name That Pokemon!

(Torterra)

(Politoed) This is my favorite!

Empoleon

Charizard

As I said before...if you don't know anything about Pokemon you can count your wallet lucky! I know there is some controversy out there among parents about the "morality" of Pokemon (a lot like there is about Harry Potter). But if you've ever seen a Pokemon movie you would find out that it's really about friendship and trusting one another and treating each other with respect. So it's alright in my book~not so much my wallet though. Hee Hee

Baby's First Birthday

First birthdays are always fun for me.

I get to make a cute little cake for the birthday baby and that just makes me smile!

Brett's mom wanted to include ducks on his cake because Brett has taken to "quacking" at everthing these days. So I made some party ducks to help him celebrate his first birthday.

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When my kids had their first birthday, they had a cake made by me (of course), but no "smash" cake. It is a southern thing and I just hadn't really heard of it yet.

My first child's first birthday was a hummingbird cake....no, not a cake that looked like a hummingbird, but a recipe called hummingbird cake (minus the nuts). My son LOVED bananas and I wanted to make a "healthy" cake (hee hee), so Hummingbird cake it was. I made some icing ballons on the top and that was the extent of my decorating.

I don't have a digital picture of his cake....but here he is on his First birthday.....9 years ago!



This is my second born....and I had advanced my technology enough to have a digital camera! So I do have pictures of him eating his cake and also of the cake before it was eaten. When I look at pictures of my early cake skills....I can only laugh and say.....good thing it tasted good!

I remember searching all over town for the candy Chuckles to make the leaves on this jungle cake. The chocolate monkeys were my very first ever attempt at using chocolate as a medium for decorating....please don't look too closely (remember this is over 7 years ago ~ so be kind) .

Well, now the cakes still taste good, and are made from the heart with love....but maybe they are a bit more civilized in the decorating techniques.

Happy First Birthday Baby!

Pokemon Cupcakes

Yesterday was my first born's 10th birthday!

Being an avid Pokemon collector and game player, he chose Pokemon as the theme for his party and cake this year. These are the cupcakes he took to school on his birthday.

Aren't they cute? Simple two toned buttercream swirls with hand drawn chocolate transfers of the Pokemon logo and Pokeballs. If you don't know what Pokemon is....count your wallet lucky!

We are actually having a party at a local fun park. With go karts, mini golf and games! You'll have to wait to see a picture of that cake, because as I am typing it is still sitting in the pans cooling in the kitchen....it's going to be a late night....

My husband promised me he WON'T turn the oven on in the morning....but that's a whole story about another cake, to be retold in another posting.

Guess I better get to my offset spatulas and icing colors!

Celebrate!

This is the inspiration for an August Birthday Celebration cake. The party was for several family members so I decided to emulate this great scrapbook paper design. It's really cool paper and I use it frequently to decorate cake boards for an extra nice touch.

Here is the cake. It is a red velvet cake with cream cheese icing. The sides are covered in red velvet crumbs and the design and borders are piped with buttercream. The candles are hand modeled from fondant.

Happy Birthday Everyone!

Pink and Brown Baby Shower

I was asked to make a baby shower cake.

The baby's nursery will be done in pink and brown so we decided that would be a good color pallette for the cake as well.

Other than the colors, I was given artistic license to design what I wanted. :o)

Babies make me think of blankets and quilts so I gave the sides a quilted pattern and embellished them with little edible pearls.

(They are a miniature version of jaw breakers, so watch your teeth!)
Here is the top view of the cake. I just love the brown fondant flowers with pink centers. I made a pink and brown fondant plaque for the center of the cake and added a couple flowers.
I just love baby showers.
Best wishes to the family and the soon to be new addition!

Party Maker Storewide Clearance Sale

This post will stray from my normal cake postings. I felt I needed to share this information with my local readers so they can take advantage of some sale prices.

I have been getting cake boards and boxes at Party Maker since they opened. They are close by and have great prices (which helps me a LOT). I am sad to say they are having to close their doors. The economy has taken it's toll on everyone and unfortunately party sales have suffered.

The owners of the store, Jay and Kezia, are a very nice family and have been great business people to work with. I am sad to see this happen, but am wishing them luck on their next venture ~whatever that may be.

So as a friend, a fellow room mom, a neighbor or cake customer ~ I know you all need party supplies at one time or another. Right now the entire store is 25% off and all of the holiday items are a whopping 50% off! Hurry in before the supplies are gone! Plates, napkins, cups, favor bags, decorations, etc!

If you're like me you might want to get some of that shopping out of the way before the holiday nears. Since I signed up for room mom this year, I went ahead and got the supplies for Halloween, Christmas, Valentines and Easter! They have all the major holidays out and that includes St Patrick's Day, Thanksgiving and New Years! Or maybe you have a milestone birthday coming up or a baby or wedding shower ~ there are so many party themes to choose from. They also have all the solid color party ware in all shades of the rainbow. If you are a sports mom, maybe get supplies in your team colors.

It's really a win win situation. It will reduce their inventory as they prepare to close and you can get some cute party ware at sale prices! So don't delay ~ the inventory won't last long! Tell your friends, neighbors, teachers, PTO members and room moms so that they may also take advantage of the sale prices!

Now I need to go find somewhere to stash my party supplies!

Have a great day!

~Karen

Back To School!

It doesn't seem possible that it is time to head back to school. But my boys are meeting their teachers today and first day of school is Wednesday! When I was growing up I know we had much more than 10 weeks of summer vacation. Of course time does seem to move more quickly the older I get, so maybe it was the same but it just lasted longer in my child's mind.

Either way, I saw a cute picture of apple cupcakes over the summer and I knew I HAD to make them when it was time to go back to school. These cute little apples have a "bite" taken out of them that reveals the "seeds" inside.

I know it's cliche', but I just can't help myself. Every year I find some "apple themed" gift for the boys to give their new teachers. These are vanilla almond sour cream cupcakes with homemade buttercream icing. Topped with a combination of sanding and sparkling red sugars and a chocolate fondant stem and green fondant leaves.
I found this cute scrapbooking paper and knew it would make a nice background for pictures!

These are the boxes they will be taking tonight when they meet their teachers. I adorned the boxes with some cute back to school themed stickers.....I find myself in the scrapbooking aisles a lot even though I don't scrapbook....hmmm.

Here's to another successful and fun year at school. Third grade for my baby and Fourth grade for my oldest. Good luck guys!