Week of Cupcakes

Easter cupcakes for my class. The "grass" looks more like cabbageheads, but my kids didn't seem to care :) Made of vanilla sprinkle cake and buttercream frosting with Robin Egg candies on top.

These cupcakes were made for my friend Angel to take to her job's Easter dinner. She asked for pretty flowers, but since I had just made bright pretty flowers, I decided to go a different route with chocolate. The cupcakes are cream cheese brownies topped with chocolate ganache. It was my first time to make ganache and I am a big fan!

The embellishments are made from candy clay. I love it! It's much more fun and yummy than fondant, in my humble opinion. I used Wilton candy melts, and they worked like a charm, much easier than baking chocolate. The brown candy clay was made from mint chocolate candy melts. I accidently bought the mint flavor, but it turned out to be a good mistake, not a bad one :). I added some candy coloring to green melts to get the teal color. I really enjoyed making these cupcakes. Some day I should try eating what I make, just to be sure it's not gross!

Cake Vase with Cupcake Roses

This weekend I made a cake vase for Deb Young's birthday. It's an idea I've had "baking" in my mind for a while, so I used her birthday as an excuse to bring it to reality. Sorry Deb!

I made the cake out of chocolate pound cake and an all-butter buttercream. I really liked the taste of the buttercream, but it was a pill for piping the roses. I carved the cake to form and then covered it in fondant. The fondant squashed the neck of the vase somewhat, I wasn't too happy with the results. So I covered it up with strips of white gumpaste. I handpainted the vase and added piping and some fondantr daisies. I used floral foam in the top to attach the mini cupcake roses. They were made out of vanilla sprinkle cake.

The vase looks pretty polished but that's thanks to mom's professional photography and photo shop editing! It was actually a lot rougher than I would have liked but hopefully I'll find more reasons in the future to practice this cake design.

Happy Birthday, Deb!

Bathtub Cake

This cake and cupcakes were made for Stefani King, an expectant mom at my school. Jessica Ham was planning the shower with a rubber ducky theme. I really was not sure what to do, so I scoured the internet like I always do, and found a lot of cute ideas. I also used some decorative tubs Jessica was using for centerpieces to help design the cake tub.

I made the tile floor out of gum paste. I hand painted it and then used royal icing as "caulk" in between the tiles. The soap was made out of gum paste also. The bubbles I made out of white candy clay that I rolled in powdered sugar and white pearl dust.


The cake is covered in Wilton fondant. I tried to cover it in handmade fondant first, but it was too dry and cracked horribly. Thankfully I had some emergency Wilton fondant on hand and it worked very nice. The baby is made out of gum paste. It was my first attempt at a gum paste figurine. Up close there were a lot of cracks. I think next time I will try a mixture of fondant and gum paste. The water is tinted gel piping. The ducks are also gum paste. The cake itself was chocolate cream cheese pound cake. The icing is white chocolate cream cheese. I used a icing whitener to give it a whiter look, but unfortunately I think it gave the icing an aftertaste.

The cupcakes are chocolate cake with the white chocolate cream cheese frosting. These ducks are actually made out of white chocolate candy clay. I wanted to make something to put on cupcakes that people will actually eat. Fondant is cute, but I'm tired of seeing it picked off on the sides of dessert plates. The "N"'s were actually fondant I believe, no wait, I think it was candy clay. It's all mixing up now! The "N"'s were for the baby, Nathaniel.

The buckles on the side were blue and gray gum paste, and then the gray was painted with silver pearl dust. So far, this was the most satisfied that I have been with a cake. However, I feel I'm still missing the mark as far as taste goes.

I have so many more ideas in my head. I just need reasons to do them and time!

Signature Wilton Oval Cake 3/23/09

My mom and I did this together, and I enjoyed it so much. It seems anything I do comes out a lot pretty when she takes part!

Spring Cupcakes for my Class

These are leftover cupcakes for my kindergarten class. They're my greatest fans :) (and good guinea pigs :P) Superb photo taken by "moi" :P Thanks to mom's #2 tip - window lighting.

The cupcakes are just vanilla with buttercream icing and fondant flowers.

Jackson's 2nd Birthday

3/14/09 - Train cake and cupcakes for my 2-year old second cousin Jackson's birthday. This train had to make a 7 hour trip and it was rough! Rule #1 - don't place cakes on a slant on their sides when traveling. Rule #2 - check your cake every once in a while (I should of remembered that from Ace of Cakes!).
The MM fondant sagged horribly, and I had a lot of structural issues anyways, but it was fun and bright at least. Seeing Jackson so excited about it made it all worthwhile. I've never seen a toddler eat so many cupcakes! Making the train cake for Jackson won his friendship right away (the first time I met him was with the train cake in my hands :)).


Jackson and his parents, Stuart and Melissa


Gab and I with the final obstacle of mounting the train on the tower top. Gab made this cupcake tower for me out of styrofoam and vinyl. It looked fantastic. Gab quickly and seriously took over the job of arranging the cupcakes. I sure didn't complain! That's the most stressful part.


Up-close shot. As always, thanks to mom for the awesome photography and making the colors really pop :) http://sharontannerphotography.blogspot.com/


Me and the train (I'm super relieved at this moment that there was no fatal cake disaster.)

Zebra Butterfly Cake

Well, I've finished another cake. This is my favorite so far. It made me really happy when I was done. I started getting on Gabriel's nerves, though, because I kept opening the refrigerator door to get another peek at the cake. Unfortunately, the cake high is only temporary. I'm ready to do another one.

The cake was made for Mrs. Hawkins, the pastor's wife at Southgate Baptist. She's a decorator with good fashion sense, so I tried to think of her when designing the cake. I stole the tablecloth idea from one of the cakes I saw in Charm City Cakes website.

I always love whem my mom or husband take the side angle shot. It always come out so pretty. Thanks so much to my mom for these super nice photos.