Christmas Cupcakes

Well you know how it is this time of year, you've got parties, and pot lucks, teachers and neighbors treats to give out. So I needed something to cover all of those. So I whipped up these cute little cupcake toppers. 75 of them to be exact. 

 I wanted to have plenty of variety, and keep them all red, white, and green. I think they turned out super cute and fun.

 These cupcakes were all moist chocolate cupcakes, with vanilla buttercream, and of course topped with a mmf topper.

Hope all your holidays were wonderful!

Winter trees and snowmen cake

I love this cake, for a few different reasons but mostly because it was so so good. I have finally perfected my red velvet recipe, and a fellow "caker" / family member gave me a recipe for white chocolate cream cheese frosting. The frosting was so good, you could eat it without any cake at all, by the spoonful, and believe me, I was tempted.

 Also, sometimes I get sick of fondant, so it was nice to have a cake just covered in frosting.
 The trees in the back are made of chocolate. and the green trees are straight fondant. I wanted to show three different techniques of making trees. (There are many more, but I didn't want to have too many, so I went with three.) Also the snowman in this pic looks like he's lost an eye, or that it's glowing, it must just be my camera. Ok, tree number one.

 Tree number two.

 And tree number three. Personally, I like tree number three the most. But it was definitely more of a pain.

In the end, I thought this was a fun cake, and super yummy, I have already made this recipe of frosting a couple more times, yummmm. Happy winter everybody!

Abby Caddaby Cake

For those of you who do not have little girls, this is Abby Caddaby. She is one of the newer Sesame Street characters.

 My girls happen to love her, as well as this little girl Maylee, who was turning two. Her mom told me to do whatever I wanted, as long as it had Abby Caddaby.

 I was "Twinkle thinking" that having her sitting up would be cuter than her flat face on the cake, so that is what I did. The Abby character is made out of marshmallow fondant. Then I decided to make it cute and girlie, to go with her. And what is more girlie than some cute and colorful flowers? I really like the way it turned out, I think it was super girlie and cute.

The cake was white cake with vanilla almond cream cheese frosting, covered in MMF. (One of my favs for sure.) 

Lemon Raspberry Cupcakes

These cupcakes were sooooo yummy. I was experimenting with some different things. I took these to a family trip. My family always gets the experiments, because I can't experiment on client cakes. But this experiment turned out so  great it is now being put on my list.

The cake is a super moist, super yummy lemon cake, and I think I'll keep that recipe to myself :) But I did want to share with you the frosting.

                                                            Fresh Raspberry Buttercream

1Stick of Butter

1/2 c. crisco (all vegetable)

2-3 tblsp milk

1 1/2 tsp lemon extract

pinch of salt

1/2-3/4c. fresh raspberries

4c. pwd sugar

Cream your softened butter with your crisco. Then add your milk, lemon, and salt. Then add your fresh (washed and dried raspberries) mix these very well. Then add your sugar, and wa'la!

Tip : I used the Wilton 1M tip to frost these. It is so simple and quick but makes it much more pretty then smushing on with a knife. Give it a try, I promise they will be a huge hit!

Over The Hill Cake

I have to say that I am not a huge fan of black over the hill cakes, that act like you are dying because you are turning 40. And hope I never get one. So when my client came to me needing an over the hill cake, I suggested we do something cute instead.

 She agreed, and that's what we went with. I decided that if I was turning 40 this is the kind of cake I would rather have. I wanted to show her sitting on top of the hill, looking happy and proud to be 40.

 I wanted it to be the opposite of black, with lots of happy and colorful flowers. I love the way these flowers turned out. Mostly I just love that it is colorful.

 I was a little worried about the little figure, in that I have never seen Shauna, and have no idea what she looks like. And I was told she has strawberry hair, a little tricky. (It's definitely easier to do blonde, or red, but in between? hmmm tricky.) Well they seemed to love it so hopefully it wasn't too far off. Although how realistic can you get when it's fondant anyway?

 Well I have to say I feel like this was a much more cheerful and fun over the hill cake than I have seen. I hope she enjoyed it.

Missionary Homecoming Cake

One of my first cakes I ever made was for my client Andy, who was leaving on a mission. So it was only fitting that I made a cake for him when he came home. 

 His mom called me in the middle of an already busy cake week, but I couldn't refuse.

 This little missionary is sitting on the England flag. A chocolate cake with Chocolate Buttercream, covered in MMF.

 I was glad to be a part of his home coming, hopefully this made him feel extra happy to come home to.

Harry Potter Cake

When I got the call to make this Harry potter cake I was excited. There are so many things you can do with Harry Potter.

 The cake itself was the book, which was chocolate cake, with peanut butter butter cream and mmf.

 Everything on this cake was edible. The snitch is straight MMF, as well as the scarf and glasses.

 The Sorting hat was my fav part of the whole cake. It was made out of rice crispy treats, and modeling chocolate, hand painted to look more old.

 The wand was also modeling chocolate.

 I originally was going to put the hat, on the book, but then ended up making it a little too big, but I think the hat needed to be bigger, so I'm happy with it. And I think Ethan was happy with it as well.

Frankenstein Cake

I had to post this before it got too far away from Halloween. This little dude was for a family Halloween party.

 My sister the photographer said I need to start taking some of my pictures on an angle. This may be not  exactly what she would do, but I do think it makes the picture look different and gives you a fun pic.

 I used my new favorite recipe that I made up, my Lemon cake, with  fresh raspberry buttercream. I have to say I knew I was going to be eating this cake and so the frosting may have been a little thick, which made the fondant a little wrinkly, but just ignore that, Frankenstein is supposed to have weird skin right?

Well, other then the few obvious issues I think it turned out fun. Happy Halloween!

BlackWidow Spider Cake

I thought I better skip ahead and post this one before it gets too far from Halloween. Although it technically was for my 8 year old nephew's Baptism party. Not your traditional baptism cake, I'm sure. But apparently he always has to have a spider cake of some sort. (And it was the weekend before Halloween.)

This is my second spider cake I have done, but this one is quite different. Now, my nephew is super smart and apparently very picky about the correctness of things. He said it had to have 8 legs and 8 eyes. But he did say he would look the other way on the red part of the spider being on the back, (it should be on it's tummy.) But if it was on the tummy you obviously wouldn't be able to see it.

I wanted it to look a bit scary so I gave him pretty big pincers. Also I love the look of the spider web underneath him. It most likely made it a bigger pain to get home, but I think it made it more dramatic. And I love the legs, I made them using Pocky, and "glued" them together with chocolate.

The eyes, I did two different ways till I knew what he wanted, so in the first picture I left them blank. 

And then in the last picture they have pupils.

I definitely like it with the pupils better.

This cake was chocolate cake with peanut butter buttercream filling, and covering the head,  along with mmf. And the fuzzy back was vanilla almond buttercream. With pocky, and chocolate legs.

Monster Truck Cake

I have a client who has five boys, and I feel like I am constantly making a cake for one of them. It's been good, because she definitely challenges me to do different cakes. 

 I myself have never been to a monster truck rally, or demolition derby, or anything like that. So when she said her son wanted the Grave Digger. I had no idea what she was talking about. Luckily for me google did. In fact the Grave Digger is a very popular monster truck, apparently.

 I was nervous about this cake when I first saw the picture, because it definitely took a bit more work, and tricks then just a round cake that is flat on the cake board. But I am happy with the way it turned out, and I was told that so was Reddick, which is the most important.

 The cake itself was chocolate with vanilla almond buttercream.

It's fun to do something that you haven't done, and rewarding when it turns out nicely. We will see what Reddick will have in store for me next year, I'll get practicing :)

Union Pacific Cake

This fall I had a really great opportunity to make a cake for the Union Pacific's 150 year anniversary. This celebration takes place all summer and fall long, in different places all over the country. The only celebration for Utah was at the Union Station in Ogden.

To celebrate, they had a dinner for all the important train people, they brought in the last train engine ever made, and had different things going on the whole day.This cake, and the cupcakes were for the dinner.

This is the biggest order I have had. And I felt it was a big honor that they asked me, and I was able to make such an important cake. The lady in charge thought it would be nice to a cake, and cupcakes as well.

 The cupcakes were, my super yummy carrot cake with vanilla almond cream cheese frosting, a pumpkin chocolate chip cupcake with vanilla filling and whipped chocolate ganache, and last a white  cupcake with orange creamcicle frosting.

 The cupcake toppers were, a railroad crossing sign, and 150, to honor the 150 year anniversary, railroad tracks, and chocolate trains.

 All together I made 75 cupcakes.The main cake itself was also quite big. It was big enough to serve about 50 people.

 The main cake was, as you can see, the Union Pacific shield. It was my yummy chocolate cake with a vanilla almond buttercream.

 All in all it was a long day, plus getting the cupcake toppers done earlier in the week. But it was all worth it. I think they also really enjoyed it which is all that matters. It was definitely fun to be a part of something so big. I was grateful for the opportunity.