Buttercream Bouquet - 8/10

I bought a new icing tip at Hobby Lobby the other day so I thought I would give it a try!  I also wanted to work on my buttercream skills (especially covering a cake).  So I made this cake--it is a 9" white cake with lemon buttercream and homemade strawberry jam filling, also covered in lemon buttercream.  The flowers, although the tip is for making mums, turned out looking more like Zinnias;)  Still pretty, just had more pointed petals than rounded like mums.  Anyway, this is my buttercream bouquet cake!

"Buttons and Bows" - 8/10

"Buttons and Bows and Twinkle Toes" was a cute little saying that I thought would go perfectly with the theme of this baby shower cake.  I really love how the colors for this one turned out.  It's just neat to see it all come together just from a vision in your head and a rough sketch on paper;)  The bottom tier was french vanilla with raspberry truffle filling and the top tier was strawberry cake with vanilla buttercream filling.  The cake is covered in marshmallow fondant with pink sugar pearl accents and fondant/gumpaste decorations.  The biggest compliment was when the dad saw the cake and said it looked like one from Cake Boss!!  Thank you and congratulations to Ron and Olivia--Welcome baby Bella! 

Definitely one of my favorites! 

Handmade Gumpaste Baby Rattle

Buttons and quilting detail

Gumpaste plaque with a saying to go with the theme

Circle Cake - 8/10

Here is a random cake I made with some leftover fondant and chocolate truffle filling.  It is a retro circle design, but my 4-year-old called it the bubble cake;)  This could be done in any choice of colors and would look even better as a tiered cake.

Precious Moments - 7/10

This was a birthday cake that I made with only 24 hours notice, but still I was glad to be able to make it for them (and strengthen my skills under pressure;)).  Their daughter is a good friend of my daughter and her mom requested a Precious Moments cake.  It is a chocolate 1/2 sheet cake covered in buttercream.  The image was also made using buttercream, flowers are royal icing. 

Lots of Dots! - 5/10

Since I had some leftover fondant from the vintage purse cake (and a box of cake mix in the cupboard), I thought it would be fun to let my oldest daughter decorate a cake with me.  So we covered the cake with white fondant and colored the rest of the fondant to make lots of different colored polka dots!  I think her favorite part was coloring the fondant;)  The top of the cake is made up of seven royal icing swirls . 

Vintage Handbag - 5/10

My Pastor's wife is really into vintage/antique things and so for her birthday, I made her a vintage purse cake with a coral flower accent and fondant pearl bracelet.  The cake was white chocolate with raspberry and vanilla buttercream filling between the layers.  The base of the cake was also covered with coral fondant.  She really loved it!

Gumpaste Flower

Pearl Bracelet

Michelle Bommarito - 4/10

The second Saturday in April, I had the privilege of meeting Michelle Bommarito, a master wedding cake artist who has appeared several times on Food Network's Challenge.  She did a free demonstration at Sweet Wise in Nashville and showcased her amazing talent.  And yes, she is really that energetic and fast-paced in person;)  Thanks for all the great tips Michelle!!

"HE IS RISEN!" - 4/10

This is personally one of my favorite cakes, most of all because of the message it brings--"He is risen!", Christ arose from the grave!  I wanted to do something other than bunnies and baskets for Easter and I had played with the idea of this cake but was not really sure if I could pull it off.  After I finally decided to go for it, I did a sketch and made the crosses ahead of time.  Then the Saturday before, a friend of mine came over and helped me and gave valuable insight as it all came together--Thanks Kristin! :) 

I was so thrilled to see the finished product (especially after the some-what confusing carving process), and how realistic the crosses and rocks looked--all it needed was a light inside the tomb!  I truly hope the Lord was pleased. 

Fondant Crosses

Empty Tomb, Stone

Valentine's Day - 2/10

What says Valentine's Day more than chocolate and roses?  CAKE with chocolate and roses!!  This was another opportunity for me to try new things--chocolate fondant and fondant roses.  The chocolate fondant recipe I used didn't work as well as regular marshmallow fondant (the basic white fondant that I use) as far as elastictisity, but still tasted good;)  I will have to find another recipe. The roses however, turned out really well, I was quite impressed as they were not very difficult to do.  The hearts were fondant and the piping was freehanded w/ buttercream.  This was also a chocolate cake filled with chocolate buttercream--YUM!!  

Fondant hearts and hot pink roses

Piping work and fondant hearts.

Batman Birthday Cake - 1/10

Here is a Batman cake I did for Trenton, the son of a good friend of mine who also helped me with it:) The two-tiered cake is covered in fondant with fondant decorations (except Batman action figure).  If I had this to do again, I would use black fondant for the buildings as more of a silouette and add more starlight.

"Gotham City"

Fondant Batman Symbol

Princess Lily's Castle - 1/10

My oldest daughter Lily loves princesses...and well, every princess needs a castle!  So I thought about buying the Wilton Castle Cake kit, but with my adventurous side tugging at me, I decided to just make one myself!  I researched a lot of different castle cake designs and combined my favorite ideas with a few of my own.  The cake was marble cake for the bottom tier, strawberry for the top, both filled and covered with buttercream.  The towers are made of ice cream cones covered with white chocolate, the door, windows and cobble stone path were all handmade with fondant and the grass and flowers are royal icing.  My daughter absolutely loved it!

Christmas Gift - 12/09

This is a Christmas gift cake I made for church.  I got to use one of my new tools to do a quilting technique and added sugar pearls where the stitches intersected.  The bow I had made originally had lots of loops but they ended up breaking as I was putting the bow together:(  So I salvaged two that were not broken and made a simpler double-loop bow and finished it off with some pearl dust.

Quilting detail.

Chocoholic's Anonymous - 11/09

This was for my husband's birthday which is only two days after my daughter's birthday.  It was definitely a "chocoholic's" cake!  It was dark chocolate cake with chocolate ganache filling and poured over, chocolate curls and pinecones made of modeling chocolate--and some leftover leaves from my fall cupcakes.

Maeve's First Birthday Cake! - 11/09

Maeve's Sunflower 1st Birthday cake!  I was so happy with how it turned out!  My husband suggested I use blue fondant to cover the cake and I'm so glad I took his advice!  It really made the sunflower stand out and added the blue sky element.  The grass is buttercream using a leaf tip and the center of the sunflower is chocolate icing using a star tip to fill it in.  I found the pre-made ladybugs at Hobby Lobby when I was getting the party decorations--they were so cute:)

Smash Cake--I need to work on my writing;)

Fall Cupcakes - 10/09

These I made in the fall of 2009, for our church picnic. I wanted to do some fondant decorations before my daughter's first birthday--and I love the warm colors of fall leaves--so decided to make these cupcakes.  Everyone loved them! 

Acorns are also made of fondant.

In the Beginning - 10/09

October 2009.  My very first cake using fondant--this was a trial cake for my daughter's first birthday that my good friend Janine helped me with.  It was so much fun and turned out better than I had expected!