Weekend's Work

I only made one cake last week and I didn't have the time to post it until now.  I made a wedding shower cake for friends Liz and Jason.  They are getting married on June 21 and I am making the wedding cake as well.  This was the first time that I had experimented with edible pearls and the cake was pretty good.

This weekend, I had a few different events going on.  The first cake I made was a baby shower cake shaped like a baby bottle.  It was a simple cake but it was cute!  My friend Shawna was hosting a baby shower for her friend of Lea and asked me to make the cake.  I had given her some baby shower favors to use that were shaped like bottles so I think bottles ended up being the theme.

Saturday was also graduation for Bentonville High School and I had two graduation cakes to make.  The first was for my friend Debbie's daughter.  They had pored over some pictures and had some pretty specific ideas of what they wanted in the cake.  I think I did a pretty good job in capturing their "vision". They also ordered 4 dozen chocolate dipped strawberries.

My second graduation cake was very similar, especially considering the fact that each client brought me a different picture!  I was able to incorporate some of the design elements from one into the other so both turned out better than their pictures!  The second cake was for my friend Angela's son Ryan.  He was having a pretty big party so I just added a book to the stack of books topped with a graduation cap.

Believe it or not, at my husband's birthday party on Sunday, there was NO CAKE!  I always make the joke that doctor's wives die young, shoemaker's wives go barefoot and baker's husbands get no treats!  But no cake on his birthday was his choice-- he asked for brownies, apple pie and ice cream.

My final "weekend" cake was a Harley cake for a 2 year old's birthday party.  I iced the cake in orange and then airbrushed flames on the sides of the 10" and 12" stacked tiers.  I then made a butter cream transfer of the Harley logo and put that on top of the cake.  The woman whose son I made it for cried when she saw it so I think it was pretty successful.

Mother's Day

Last week, I had a brilliant idea!  I asked some of my "regular" cake customers if they wanted to order Mother's Day cakes for their wives.  I was going to make the same cake for everyone so I knew it would be an easy thing.  I ended up with orders for 5 cakes.  They were all different sizes but identical flavors.  The cake was a strawberry cake with vanilla bean cream cheese icing and sliced strawberries between the layers.  The whole thing was iced and decorated with more vanilla bean cream cheese and topped with fresh whole strawberries.  They were a HUGE hit!

An Apple a Day

This past week was National Teacher's Week.  My friend Katie's daughter is autistic and has really benefited from the extra attention her teachers have paid her.  Katie has always been good about thanking them on a regular basis but she asked me to put together a special treat for them.  I asked Katie to get some cupcake boxes and she found the hot pink stripes box at Hobby Lobby.  Wednesday night I had to make two other cakes so I found myself making cupcake "apples" at around 2 AM.  They were SO cute! (Sorry if you think they look like cherries, Ranee-- they are definitely apples!)  Katie and Kaia liked them and they are the only ones who really counted!

I forgot to take pics of the other two cakes I made... one was a Steeler's good-bye cake for my friend in Pharmacy.  The other was a chocolate ganache cake with chocolate covered strawberries!

First Communions

It has been a week of communions!  The first was for the son of a friend from work and they were not having a big party-- in fact, Brady doesn't even like cake!  But the parents felt it was a tradition they needed to keep-- plus, they LOVE cake!  It is SO difficult to come up with a design that is NOT feminine but I did the best I could with this small cake.

The second party was for Jonathan, my boss's son and they were planning on a big party.  I'd been thinking of a design for awhile so I had plenty of time (and cake!) to make it unique!  I made a three-tiered stacked cake with borders of variegated blue squares.  It was a mosaic-style design and I topped it with a Wilton cross topper

Truffles, Cupcakes and Electric Guitars!

Once again, I overcommitted myself and somehow agreed to make 3 cakes and 48 cupcakes for Friday pickups!  I continually find myself saying I am going to cut back but I never say no!

The first cake I made was a chocolate strawberry truffle cake-- I was asked to make a cake for a chocoholic so I thought I would combine my homemade bittersweet chocolate truffles rolled in cocoa powder with some dark chocolate dipped strawberries on top of a chocolate layer cake iced with chocolate buttercream icing.  I also promised to make someone else a small truffle cake so I kind of killed two birds with one stone.

My third project was 48 puppy cupcakes.  I got a lot of practice making these last weekend but they are still time consuming!  It took several hours to make them all but they are SO cute!

My last project was a Rock Star cake for Gracen... I made her cake last year and it was a circus theme.  Gracen is anything BUT ordinary so this year she decided on a rock star theme... her mom sent me pictures of a cake they liked and I decided to try to improve on that.  First, I wanted to give it three tiers but they didn't need so much cake so I made them smaller.  I also ordered some candy molds from a website to make the guitars and music notes but the molds had not come in the mail by Thursday so I panicked!  I asked my friend Katie to make some guitars and musical notes while I made a skull out of black fondant... I have to say that it turned out really awesome!  Katie did SUCH a great job-- I might have to make this cake for MY birthday!

Puppies, Kitties, Mario, Birthdays and Engagements!

Moving to more recent cakes...

My first "cake" yesterday was actually 60 cupcakes and a mini individual cake for a 5 year old's party. She is the daughter of a good friend of mine and because of that, I didn't sleep AT ALL Friday night to be able to finish these!  I made 10 schnauzers, 10 terriers and 10 kittens, plus 30 pawprint cupcakes and a shi-tzu mini cake.

My second cake was a Mario cake for a 5 year old boy. His parents had just bought him a Wii and he is very into his Mario game.  Apparently, he is quite the bowler as well-- we might have to think about a challenge!

My last cake of the day was for our very good friend Shawna's 22nd birthday! Shawna is Ryan's girlfriend... now fiance!  Ryan has been a good friend since we met 3 years ago and when he started dating Shawna, we added her to our group seamlessly...  lately, we have started bugging Ryan about when he was going to marry her because they are so perfect together.  We showed up at her birthday party yesterday and the first thing she did after looking at the cake I had made her was to show us her ring!  It is beautiful and we are SO happy for them!  I can't wait to start talking about wedding cakes for them!  Congrats guys- we love you!

Andrea's Wedding

I haven't posted for awhile-- I have alot to catch up on!

A few weekends ago I made a wedding cake and groom's cake for Andrea and Jason.  Their reception was at the Shrimpman's Yacht Club in Bella Vista.  We had never been there so we didn't know what to expect but the place was gorgeous!  I felt bad for Andrea-- the location told the couple they could decorate on Saturday for the Sunday weekend, but then they booked a Saturday event! Jason and Andrea had to START decorating at 10PM on Saturday night!  But no matter-- when we delivered the cake the next morning, it was beautiful!

The wedding cake was a simple all white cake with buttercream icing.  Three tiers were stacked and decorated very simply but at the reception site I sprinkled red rose petals all over the cake and then topped it with a beautiful crystal monogram.

The groom's cake was a chocolate half-sheet decorated like a football field with with a Razorback bride and groom at the 50 yard line.  This is a pretty popular cake-- I make at least 6-8 each year!