Carousel Cake... and Cookies!

I had the pleasure of designing a celebration cake for my friends' 10 month old twins.  They were visiting from out of town to celebrate their Christening.  I mentioned previously about having fun with fondant covered cookies and this design was perfect!!

 The cake was alternating layers of zesty lemon and chocolate sour cream cake with vanilla swiss meringue buttercream with that added bonus of sugar cookies.  I also displayed it on a lazy Susan so it was fun to spin it around.

Where the Wild Things Are Party

Last week, I posted a cake based off of the book Where the Wild Things are.  I'm so excited to share with you the party that my client threw.  Just to be clear, I didn't put this party together - these details were all put together by my client.  I was so amazed by her details and she let me share her photos.

 She purchased some of the items from Etsy.  Now look how cute that birthday boy is!

 Those straws say "I'll drink you up" and I love the "Wild Eats"

Bridal Shower Sweet Table

Another fabulous sweet table collaboration with one of my clients for a bridal shower.  The theme was an elegant lace and antique-y design.  My client decorated the room with so many handmade flowers and accents - it was amazing!  She hand-soaked the paper doilies in tea and baked them - now that is patience and creativity.

The desserts included: lemon meringues, white chocolate dipped pretzels, brownie cake pops (made by my client), lemon tarts, 3 strawberry vanilla cakes with strawberry buttercream covered in vanilla swiss meringue buttercream, double chocolate cake bites, fondant lace sugar cookies and milk and fruit skewers (made by my client)

 I really loved how these fondant lace sugar cookies turned out!

Cutest Baby Shower Cake

I couldn't be more excited to share this beautiful baby shower cake design.  I fell in love with every part of it.  

For the cake topper, I was inspired by this etsy print that I had pinned a long time ago as I knew it would be great inspiration for a cake.  I love Pinterest for that!

The mom-to-be loved the cake and she is saving all the handmade sugarpaste decorations for a shadow box to hang in the babies room.  How wonderful!

Sesame Street Sweet Table

A follow-up from last week's Sesame Street cake for my daughter.  We had a small get-together with our family with this snack and dessert table.

The desserts included a neopolitan birthday cake and strawberry vanilla cupcakes.  We have some family members that follow a paleo diet so I also had paleo chocolate chunk cookies, paleo chocolate avocado brownies and lots of fruits and veggies.

Happy 2nd Birthday to my sweet girl!

 Another photo of the fun Sesame Street ideas - thanks to Pinterest for all the ideas!

1st Birthday: Classic Winnie the Pooh Cake

Many people ask if I have favorite cakes that I have made and it is really hard to narrow down a small selection.  However, I have to admit, I really fell in love with this cake design of Classic Winnie the Pooh.

The client said that I could do whatever I wanted for the 1st birthday cake.  I was so excited, as I love Classic Pooh.  I read the ABC book to my daughter every night before bedtime.

The 2-tiers of cake were banana sour cream cake with vanilla swiss meringue buttercream, as the birthday boy, Liam loves banana.

Here is sweet little Liam with his parents blowing out the candle (they had the perfectly matching candle too!)  I also received the most wonderful Thank You card in the mail from them last week - it sure made my day!

Louis Vuitton Purse Cake

I never tire of creating Louis Vuitton purse cakes, although I must admit, I always hope the logo gets easier to handpaint... but it doesn't.  It still takes longer than I plan but the result is so rewarding.

My client asked for a classic style LV purse similar to a cake design that I made up a couple years ago.  So, I chose the Louis Vuitton Beverly GM.

This cake was alternating layers of chocolate sour cream and vanilla butter cake filled with vanilla swiss meringue buttercream and covered with chocolate fondant.

 

Here is a view of the side and back of the purse cake - handpainted logos everywhere.  If you are interested in attempting a purse cake, you can refer to my purse cake tutorial.

Angry Birds Cake

Raise your iPhone or mobile device if you are addicted to this Angry Birds game?  Actually, I spend countless hours playing Scrabble on my iPhone, so for this cake - I had to do lots of research on this game.  I soon realized that it was all in the details and I had so much fun with it!

This was the first time I actually made a backdrop to a cake.  It started out as two cakes and then I ended up making the 3 birds and the TNT mini-cakes.   The 6 cakes were alternating layers of chocolate sour cream and strawberry vanilla cake.

Everything else is handmade out of fondant and the stacking bricks were Rice Krispie squares covered in fondant.

And yes, there is that golden egg hidden back there.

Cakelava Cake Designs

Last week, I had the pleasure of attending a 3-day "Discover your Inner Artist" class with the amazing and uber-talented cake designer Rick Reichart of cakelava.  Rick and his wife Sasha traveled all the way from Hawaii to the amazing cake studio and classroom of Icing Inspirations in Waterloo, Ontario.

Rick was a fabulous teacher as he guided us through two of his amazing designs;  the very popular 3-tier tall hibiscus cake and a Clownfish sculpted cake.  He generously shared with us his design style, techniques, thoughts and created this wonderful atmosphere for all of us to get lost in our cakes.

Here is the wonderful line-up of hibiscus cake designs.  Each one has its little personalization to the floral pattern as they are freehand cut (no cutters).  My cake sits on the far right and the photo below.

 Here I am with the amazing and so genuinely nice cakelava duo Rick and Sasha Reichart.

 

I must also mention all other the wonderful people that I met.  The owners, Chrissie and Justin, of Icing Inspirations and Too Nice to Slice who held these classes - very kind and accomodating to us.  I also met my longtime blog-friends, Brandy, of Cakes-a-nonymous and Angela from The Sugar Cove.

I met so many new cake friends - it was such a wonderful experience to be in a room with so many people with the same passion.  One minute we are all laughing and chatting it up - the next minute, there is complete silence as we are all concentrating on painting the fine details of our cakes.  I loved that - I was in my element!

Here's a photo of Brandy (who kept me laughing all 3 days) and I with our finished clownfish cakes.  Also a top-view of all the sugar details we made during class.

I took so many photos, here are some of my additional favorite ones.  Imagine 17 people airbrushing 2.5 feet tall cakes.... that was a funny moment.

I had the pleasure of meeting the sweet Carrie Biggers of the famous Carrie's Cakes in Utah.  I have been following her beautiful work for many years.

Rick with the clownfish cake all iced with buttercream and ready for fondant - yes, it is cake!

Louis Vuitton Purse Cake

Fashionista cakes are always very popular cake inquiries.  I love making them the exact dimensions so people think that it is actually a purse.  I did one of the most challenging patterns recently... the Louis Vuitton Monogram Multicolore Speedy 30.  It was a surprise 30th birthday cake for my client's wife.

This cake was pretty big - 11.8" x 8.3" x 7.3" (LxHxD) - about 8 layers of vanilla butter cake.  

Here is a view from the back.  I really did underestimated how many logos I needed to paint.  But finally in the wee hours of the morning when  I finished handpainting each side - it was amazing to see it all come together.

Baby Shower Cake

I was asked to create a baby shower cake with only 1 request, that it would have a pair of sugar running shoes on it.  Otherwise, I had all the design freedom.  I love cakes like these and I loved how the cute running shoes turned out.

I designed the cake based on a little wagon, inspired by my nephew who loves to pile things high and pull it around the house.  I can't wait to do a similar design this weekend.

Here is a view from the top of the cake.

And another photo of the running shoes.  I don't use a template - I just search for cute shoes on the internet and try to copy them.  I'm so happy how they turned out.

Toronto Life Cupcakes (and a cake....)

I was invited to be a part of a Toronto Life online article called The City's Most Beautiful Cupcakes.  And you know how I love creating Toronto-themed cupcakes....

We were asked to submit a sampling of our cupcakes, whatever flavors we wanted and whatever design that best represents our cupcakes.  A Toronto Life magazine is the perfect inspiration for cupcakes - so I made a magazine cake and then cupcakes with handmade sugarpaste toppers to match the different sections.

From top left and clockwise:  Food,  Drink, Cupcakes (of course), Shopping, Pizza and Weddings.

 

For more photos, there is a flickr page from the writer.

30th Birthday: Toolbox Cake

Back in March, I made a pink baby shower cake tower for a client.  With a brand new 1 month old - she was able to pull off a surprise 30th birthday party for her husband.

Her husband is an electrician so she loved the idea of a red toolbox filled with lots of his tools including hammer, marrets (caps for the wires), wire cutter, screwdriver, outlet and multi-meter.

The cake was Chocolate Sour Cream cake with vanilla swiss merinuge buttercream.  All the items were edible and handmade out of sugarpaste.  It was so fun to see it all come together!