The Poker Cake

Steven came home from Iraq for some R and R this past week. We are so happy to have him home, even if it is just for 2 weeks. While he's been in Iraq, he turned 21 so we had a party for him. I, of course, made a cake for the occasion. Here it is...

The Valentine's Day Cake

I'm somewhat proud of this cake I just made. I was up pretty late finishing it and hopefully everyone at Jessie's Theatre Production after party will enjoy eating it too!. Obviously, I used the gum paste roses on the cake. I think it turned out well!

Roses are pink...

My friend Mignon is helping with an event this weekend in Sumner, The Wine Walk. Her daughter will be performing with her theatre group and the theme is weddings and the 40's. To assist in their project, and to get some hopeful advertisement for myself I am making a cake for the after party. Today I made my first gumpaste roses. The first one I made I followed the directions in the book and it's in need of some love. The next ones I made I basically just did what I felt was realistic. Here is a picture of the few I have made so far.

The castle cake

Here is the cake I made for my good friends daughter. She turned 8 this month. She really loved the cake and I had fun making it.

Karizma's Sweet 16

Today I delivered a cake for the HHH for a girl who is turning 16. Her name is Karizma, very cute name! Anyway, I tried to do something a little special for her and I hope she always remembers her 16th birthday! Happy Birthday Karizma!

Dora Cake

Here's my cake for a 2 year old Sanjya from HHH. Hopefully she enjoyed it! It was cherry chip with lemon filling. Happy Birthday Sanjya!

Today was Becky's retirement party at Farelli's. She has worked 30 years at the post office and Wednesday will be her last day. There were so many people there for her. I hope that many people show up for my retirement party in 30 years. Here's a couple pictures of the cake I made for her. The mailbox was a bit iffy but they seemed to like it. Everything in the photo is edible except the post and the stems for the flowers. The letter below is made from gumpaste and used edible ink.

More cakes

Today I made two cakes. One was donated to Helping Hand House for a 7 year old girl and one was purchased by my supervisor for her twin 15 year olds. She has a boy and a girl. I sort of forgot that I had the one for the HHH. Actually, I thought it was due on the 21st. At any rate, I was able to get both done and delivered on time!

Football and Castles

Today I made cakes for two very different things. My brother-in-law asked me to make a cake for his dessert auction to raise money for his football team. They gathered cakes and desserts to auction so I just made a black and white cake. It was one layer chocolate and another white decorated with white and chocolate frosting. I tried to fancy it up and I guess it worked. It sold for $65.00, the second highest cake sold! Of course, I had to ask cause I'm so competitive! At any rate, it went to a good cause and hopefully the people enjoyed it.

The other cake I made today was for a three year old little girl so I made a pink castle cake. It turned out pretty well.

For a bridal shower

A friend at work asked me two days ago if I could make and emergency cake for her. Her family was celebrating a bridal shower on Friday and the person they were going to have make the cake was unable to do so. The brides mother wanted a bustier cake and Terry (my work friend) wasn't sure they were going to be able to get something like that from a bakery. She asked me if I would and I gladly said yes. Truth be told I was very excited to try my hand at a new creation. It would be one for the books. I worked for a few hours on it today and when she picked it up she was very happy with it. She said it was very lifelike and the bride's mother would be thrilled! I can't wait to talk to Terry tomorrow and see how things went. Let me know what you think too!

Recent cakes I've made

I've been so bad with my blogging lately. Sorry Mignon. You're probably the only one reading this anyway. But here are my latest cake creations...

Donated cake for a 7 year olds birthday.





My neices 10th and 11th birthday party.


My friend, Mignon and I made cupcakes!



Our labor day fantasy draft cake. The uprights didn't survive

Steven and Christine's wedding

As you know, Steven and Christine are getting married on August 3rd. We have mixed feelings. We are happy for the two of them, but wish it wasn't happening so fast due to him going to Iraq. The plus side to this whole thing is I get to make my first wedding cake! I am so happy, excited and nervous. I don't want to mess it up but I think what she has decided on is totally doable! I hope to take pictures all throughout the process of making this cake so I can look back on them. Wish me luck and pray for my nephews safe return!

Khai's cake!

Here's the cake for the 9 year old little boy I made tonight. It was devil's food with marshmallows in it and buttercream frosting. Happy Birthday Khai!

Two cakes in one night...sheesh

Today I decorated two cakes. Jennifer's party is tomorrow and I won't be able to attend so I had to finish hers tonight and take it over to her. It turned out ok I think. She seemed to like it.

After I got that finished and delivered at 8pm, I started on the cake for the contest my sis entered me in at Joann's. It wasn't even close to what I had planned. I had something pretty elaborate but time wouldn't allow due to the crunch of having to rebake them last night. I was a day behind. So I just whipped up something simple since I had them baked anyway. It's cute and simple but I like it. Sheldon called in amatuerish. I agree but then again, I am an amatuer. My little sis is going to take it over for me tomorrow and take pictures of the other cakes. I have no expectations but it is good practice.

The Cake Contest Fiasco

I recently posted about my sister entering me in a cake contest at Joann's. I've had a setback today. I baked all 6 of the cakes I was going to use for the contest and was going to work on the decorations while the graduation cake I am making for Jennifer, my newphew's girlfriend, after work today. Unfortunately, when I got home from work today there was an incident. My youngest newphew, who's 2, pulled out a chair at the breakfast bar and that is an open invitation for my dogs to get up on the counter, Buster specifically. My sister left the house and they had an hour of free time, plenty of time to pull open a box of cake mix and cross over the kitchen sink to the oven where the cakes were. They were sitting along the back of the wall, four yellow and two chocolate. He ate the tops from all but one of the chocolate ones. Why he left just one untouched, I do not know. How do I know it was Buster? The guilty look on his face, the hiding in the corner and the bulging stomach were all I needed to come to that conclusion. Well, back to the drawing board. If I have time to bake the rest after I get Jennifer's cake baked, I will try, try again and hope that I have time tomorrow night to decorate it.

The cake contest

My big sister works at Joann's on South Hill. While I was away on my 11 day adventure with my baby sister, she signed me up for a cake decorating contest at her store. Mind you I arrived home Saturday afternoon and I just got the paper from her today stating the rules of this contest. I also have only attended one cake decorating course but nonetheless, she has entered me into this contest. I think I came up with a "cute" idea for the theme which is Summer in the Northwest. I'm going to use my new hexagon shaped cake pans which I purchased while in Naperville. (There is a Wilton store there! SO many neat things, so little to spend.) At any rate, I'm going to start making some fondant figures tomorrow after work, while my gigantic cake is baking. This will be a somewhat new experience as I have only made one fondant figure. Oh well, it's all in fun and it will be interesting to see other cakes. Hopefully my sister will take some pictures for me as I will be working during the judging, which happens at noon. Wish me luck!

Memorial Day Cake

Here's the cake I made for our Memorial Day Barbeque at Lisa and Eric's house on Monday. It turned out fairly well.

The three cake day

For the month of May I was scheduled to make a total of four cakes for the Helping Hand House. The last three were due the 23rd, 26th and the 29th but I received a request to have them all ready by the 23rd because of the holiday weekend. Unfortunately I got that request on Tuesday evening. Wednesday night after work, I spent 4 hours baking 3 cakes that I would have to decorate on Thursday night after work. I planned on a Spongebob cake for a 3 year old little boy, a baseball field for a 10 year old boy and just a simple round cake for a 17 year old girl.

So after another 4 hours of frosting making, coloring, tip swapping, crumb layers and real layers of frosting I finally finished all three cakes and got them delivered to Lisa so she could hand them out to their birthday girl and boys. Whewwwww! Another job done and May cakes are done!

Happy Birthday Ashley

Ok so I don't know Ashley but I've made a cake for her and her family to celebrate her 15th birthday. My sister-in-law works for Helping Hand House and they help families who are struggling. Since she knows how much I like to bake, she asked if I would donate my time to bake birthday cakes for the children she works with and I happily agreed. April 7th Ashley will turn 15. It isn't my best work. I think I mixed my frosting too much to get it purple and it had too many air bubbles so it didn't smooth nicely. Hope her family enjoys the cake!

No class!

Well, I'm bummed. Tonights class was cancelled due to our teacher having a family emergency. I sure hope everything is ok with her family but I was SO looking forward to learning the rose. I attempted to make them myself by reading the directions but it's so much tougher to learn those kind of things from a book instead of seeing the technique up front. So I "played" with the cake I was supposed to decorate in class because I told the folks at work I'd bring in a cake. So here is my little masterpiece. It's cute...I guess. So much perfecting still left to do though. Practice, practice, practice. Someday I might be a pro...