Decorated Cupcakes!

Over the past couple of months I was able to make individual decorations for cupcakes for occasions from baby showers to birthdays. I love the look of a bunch of cupcakes with the little decorations on top.

I made a bunch of these little cuties for a baby shower. They were the perfect little bite of sweetness all in one!

I love the little army of cupcakes. They look so cute. All lined up and ready for battle.

These next ones were for another baby shower made back in June. They were made to match the invitations and were vanilla with a ganache filling. YUM!

The fondant decorations were all cut by hand even down to the little indents in the surfboards. And I love these little wrappers. I could use them all the time! The scalloped edge is adorable!

And as always, my little army of turtles all riding out to surf the party together :)

And these were my first attempt at making sugar flowers by hand. They took a lot of research, trial & error, & time to get right, but I think I finally got the hang of it toward the end there.

The colors of the party were pink and purple and they painted lilies :) And if you ever wondered what an army of sugar lilies looked like...

Thanks for checking out my cupcakes :) Let me know any fun ideas you may have for my next project!

New Obsessions.

Firstly, I have been absolutely obsessed with watching Amazing Wedding Cakes on WEtv. I know it's a little bit corny the way they describe exactly what everything is, but I love watching the different cakes they produce from the consultation all the way to delivery. I love seeing the inside of all of their shops. Some of them have little stores where you can get coffee and a cupcake or some delicious cookies. Some of them have gorgeous little industrial buildings that they have perfectly equipped for their cake making.

My favorite shop to follow is the White Flower Cake Shoppe in Ohio. It gives me hope that one day I can own my own shop in not-as-popular cities. They make such cute enormous cakes, my favorite being the glam cake, or maybe the black and white gift boxes cake.

Images courtesy of Facebook

Image courtesy of Google

These girls and their cakes are definitely an inspiration to me. I see how young and successful they are, and it proves to me that it can be done.

Secondly, I have discovered that I own over 500 cupcake wrappers. I need to get baking. I have so many cute ones from Bake it Pretty that I still have yet to use. I can't find occasions to make them for. But since June is officially cupcake month, I vow to make at least 5 new cupcake flavors in some of these adorable wrappers. Comment here and tell me some flavors you'd like to see :)

Thirdly, I love this apron.

It's so cute and chic. I would wear it every day. It's made by Flirty Aprons and if it ever goes on sale, it's mine. :)

Thanks for reading about my baking obsessions. Comment here and tell me about some of yours!

Congratulations Graduate :)

This cake is definitely conflicting, but somehow it just works. You can see that just for this graduate the Auburn Tiger and Florida Gator had a truce.

Just once.

I couldn't figure out the best lighting at one am, so I hope these shots do it justice. My favorite part is the inside of the gator's mouth. 

My favorite part was making the figures on top. It's like playing with play-doh, only grown up! With more tools and less tolerance for misshapen-ness.

The cake says "War Eagle Gator Grad."

Congratulations Peyton!

Hoppy Easter!

I was asked to make these for a little girl's birthday earlier this month and was waiting until today to post them :)

Here's the army of cute little bunnies :)

A close up of my favorite. PINK!

Happy Easter!

Ladybugs, Peace Signs, Ducks... OH MY!

I've been slacking again, I know. I just moved in to a new apartment, got a dog, and I'm finishing up another semester at school. It's been crazy. But I've still managed to fit some baking projects in :)

Let's start with some mini swirl cheesecakes. The recipe I used was fairly easy, but it lied to me about how to make the swirls. They were impossible the way the recipe showed me. So I started all over again on batch #2, and I was happy, but it was not perfect. So it looks like there's another art I will be perfecting, when I have a second of free time that is.

Super close up.

The next ones are some of my favorite cupcakes I've made. I think if I were 16 again, I would have these at my birthday party. Maybe even 17. Oh who am I kidding... I'd have these for my birthday this year :)

I love this picture. How fluffy the butter cream looks, how cute the cupcake looks on the pedestal, and even how imperfectly the fondant sits on top of it.

This duck cake is absolutely adorable. She didn't want too much blue, or for it to be too boyish. So this was what I came up with.

I just had to add the "it's a boy" up top. I wanted to use the Cricut for something!

But the bubble clusters were definitely my favorite part. So cute!

Anyway, that's what I was up to in the month of March. Just wait until you see what I've been up to this month :)

Oh yeah, I bet you all want to see what the little puppy looks like. He's gotten so big already!

This was him the day we got him. SO TINY!

And this is him now.....

This is him now. Yeah. HUGE!

Bella's 2nd Birthday

James' niece is one of the cutest little babies I have ever seen. She tries to imitate the faces I make at her, she knows where here fingers and eyes and ears are, and she loves to run to you and throw herself into your arms! I love to spoil her like she's my own!

For her first birthday, I made her this adorable pink and brown cake for her Chuckie Cheese birthday party.

Please excuse all the things in the background... a year ago I did not understand the importance of making sure I took some photos before the actual event!

This year... I made her something a little more elegant.

I loved how the colors worked together, the lighter lavender colored buttercream with the darker purple butterflies.

And I couldn't resist using my adorable little cake stands and take one out for a photo shoot by the pool. Doesn't it look like the butterfly should just take off and fly around in the lanai?

UPDATE: By the way, I had to add this adorable picture of Isabella enjoying the cupcakes :)

Face first, all in. Adorable.

Take Me Out to the Ball Game!

Now, I'm not saying I support the team... I'm a Met's fan, born and raised. But I will say that I think this Yankees cake was pretty darn fun to make!

I haven't been able to find that perfect yellow cake recipe yet. So if anyone has some suggestions, I'd love to hear them. This one was pretty good, but I'm not going to settle here :)

Start with creaming the butter.

The batter looked really nice when it was all mixed together.

They were definitely nice and golden when they came out of the oven.

Then you have to give it a nice crumb coat.

The beginnings of the decorations. This got me really excited.

I got to use my Cricut cake cutter for the first time! I know some people thing that this is cheating, but it really is a lot of hard work. You have to use gum paste and make sure that it isn't too sticky before using the machine, otherwise it likes to clump up and won't make clear cuts.

This side of the cake I had to cut out by hand. So that makes up for using the Cricut on the other side, in my opinion. It was really rewarding to make a well-known logo out of fondant like that and have it look pretty darn close to the real thing.

Here is the finished product... but wait, you haven't gotten to see my favorite part yet...

THE TOP!

pretty believable...huh!

So here's the whole finished product!

And the delivery. I prefer to travel with my creations safely on my lap.

And here's me, the perfectionist, making sure I touch it up before the birthday boy sees it... in the back of the car!

Who Lives In a Pineapple Under the Sea?

SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS!

So I was asked to make Spongebob cupcakes for a little girl's birthday party recently. I was really excited about this request because I had been wanting to do three things for a while: sculpt and make shapes out of fondant, use my new exacto knife, and use my new edible ink pens!

Now I couldn't for the life of me figure out how to make these photos sit horizontally, but I wanted to include them to show the process these cupcakes went through. As I cut out each step, I saw a little bit more of Spongebob and Patrick forming. This was one of the first projects I've done where I was able to plan and execute what I wanted to accomplish in a timely and organized manner. Woo hoo!

These are Spongebob's noses and mouths.

They both looked kind of creepy with just eyes!

Then all of a sudden... POOF!

They came together so quickly!

And just as quickly as I started, they were finished! Except for the black dots on Spongebob's eyes.

Sometimes Patrick looks cross-eyed, sometimes he looks angry, but he always has that goofy smile!

Spongebob pre-black dots.

Spongebob post-black dots.

I couldn't decide which one I liked more. But I obviously couldn't take it back once it was done.

I was very excited and very proud once these little cuties were finished.

These cupcakes were made for a party at Sketch and Sip. Patty Sisco, the owner is one of the most creative people I know and I am so glad I've been able to work with her on so many occasions. I could actually write a whole post on all the occasions we've worked together or worked on projects for each other. As a matter of fact, that's a wonderful idea! Mental Note. :)