Where It All Began..

The housewarming we hosted back in 2011 was pretty much the start of it all for me.  Sadly, since I was not completely obsessed with the whole process yet, I only have two photos of this one.. the cake (of course!) and the invitation.

 The cake was pumpkin spice with a cream cheese glaze
(which I had obviously dyed orange).

 

What's New?

Lately I have developed a new interest of pursuit - party planning! Along with designing custom cakes, I've discovered a passion for putting on a fabulous celebration. 

So I thought I would add a special blog page devoted to all my party-planning ventures! Whatever the occasion, or budget, may be.. from choosing a theme, to designing the perfect invitation, to decor and food.. I'm in love with it all. Parties are so exciting, and there are countless ways of making events personal and fun! Head on over to my Parties page and you'll see just what I mean!

Lily Cupcakes {for Baby Lily}

About a month ago my step-daughter, Emily, had a shower for her baby girl.. already named Lily. Originally she wanted cupcakes frosted to look like flowers (I did something like this last June for my other step-daughter, which you can see here). While thinking about her request, I came up with the idea of placing a 'lily' on each cupcake. I asked Emily what she thought and she loved it! 

So we went to Hobby Lobby (I think they have some of the most realistic silk flowers).. obviously I couldn't use live lilies as they are not food-safe. We were in search of purple lilies, since purple was the main shower color. We found purple lilies but only in a small bushel, which actually works great for cupcakes because the blooms are mini-sized. Sometimes these flower bushes can be expensive but HL floral was 50% off that day so I paid just $5 for about 40 lilies! I snipped the flower part off each individual stem, leaving a bit of stem on to shove down into the frosting - worked out great!

I made simple chocolate and vanilla cupcakes topped with vanilla buttercream - and a lily. Here's how they turned out.. ohhh the elegance!

 

Hot Wheels Cupcakes

Ok so bear with me as I attempt to get caught up on my blog entries.. it's been a long and busy year! {see previous post with regard to my recent blog hiatus}...

Meanwhile, back on July 5th, we celebrated Oliver's 4th Birthday! {sniff sniff} He decided on a "Hot Wheels" theme since he has a slight obsession with them right now. For his cake, we chose to do Creamsicle Cupcakes (cupcakes are always easier than a cake when I have a million other things to do for a party). He's been LOVING Creamsicle yogurt these days so the flavor decision was an easy one.

I also chose a pretty simple way to incorporate the Hot Wheels theme into his cupcakes.. via handmade cupcake toppers that I found at Over the big Moon. All I had to do was print and cut them out. Here's a pic of a couple of the toppers along with some mini water bottles I put together for his party. Super cute, right?

Here are some pics of the completed cupcakes with toppers. They are orange cake (which was a doctored vanilla cake mix).. with vanilla custard filling and whipped cream frosting. YUM! I thought "chrome" wrappers would be fitting for our theme.. even my cupcake stand had rims!  You can see more of Oliver's party details on my party page! 

The Birthday Boy blowing out his candles <3
 

Wow.. Long Time Gone!

So... as you may (or may not) have noticed, my previous post was for a cake I completed in June of last year! Yes, it's been over a year since I've done much with cakes, or anything with my blog.. but for a very good reason. I had a baby!!! That's the good part.. the bad part was that much like my first pregnancy, I was extremely sick for most of the 9 months. I had a condition with both my pregnancies known as "Hyperemesis Gravidarum".. aka HG. Without going too much into the horrific details, let me just say it effects about 2% of pregnant women (lucky me, right?) and is primarily characterized by EXTREME nausea and vomiting.. yeah.. not so much fun. In fact it is quite debilitating.. hence the extensive cake/blog hiatus. 

I now have 2 little guys keeping me on my toes every day.. Oliver (4) and Edison (5 months). And although it's quite hectic around here most days, I actually do miss caking and blogging. I will be scaling back on cakes since it's a lot for me right now with 2 little ones.. heck it was a lot with just Oliver! For the time being, I'm going to focus on my boys (they're only little once!) and family. Since I can't imagine giving up cakes completely, I'll continue to do family cake requests (hoping this will allow me to keep up my skills as well).

You may also notice my blog itself has a new look, with some additional features. I felt like it was time for some changes since life has changed a lot for me in the last year. In addition to a new design, I wanted to update the pages to reflect more of what I've been up to these days (aside from babes and cakes ;) ..including some party planning and DiY fun. Hope you like it! ..And now.. on with some cake posts! 

Strawberry Shortcake Cake

Last week I made a Strawberry Shortcake Cake for my step-daughter, Emily (she wanted it for her bf's birthday.. apparently he LOVES strawberry shortcake ;)  It's a simple cake, which I found the recipe for from the Food Librarian, but OMG, I wanted to eat this one myself so badly!  The recipe link can be found here.  It's just two (or three depending on how you make it) buttermilk cake layers (which smell just like buttermilk biscuits when they're baking.. you know the kind you have with regular SS?!  Yum!).. top the cake layers with macerated strawberries (fancy term for strawberries that have been hulled, sliced, and soaked in granulated sugar with a bit of vanilla).. finished off with some fresh whipped cream.. so simple but so de-lish!

Below are some pics of my version.  I was told the birthday boy loved it!

  

Flowering Cupcakes

This past weekend was my step-daughter, Michaela's, 'BABY BBQ' (basically a jack & jill style baby shower - though we hated to use the word "shower").. Just a casual get together for all to celebrate the arrival of her (and bf's) little princess, sometime next month!  Of course I was in charge of making dessert ;)  ..Michaela decided early on she wanted cupcakes rather than a cake.. flavors, however, came much later and after much deliberation!  She also wanted to incorporate flowers into the look of the cupcakes.  Hmmmmm..... I debated doing fondant flowers vs. frosting flowers for a bit.. then we both sort of agreed on making them out of the frosting on the cupcakes.  For flavors, we eventually settled on three.. 1) Chocolate Peanut Butter Banana, 2) Lemon Blackberry, and 3) Strawberry Cheesecake.. each flavor to be frosted with a different flower type.  

For the Chocolate Peanut Butter Banana.. I made a Banana cupcake with Peanut Butter filling, then iced it with Chocolate Buttercream in 'Rose' fashion (which is a pretty simple technique using a Wilton tip 2D, starting in the center of the cupcake and working your way outward in a counter-clockwise motion).  I have done this technique previously and it's simple yet elegant looking.

The Strawberry Cheesecakes.. a basic strawberry cupcake topped with cheesecake filling for the icing.  I again replicated a flower I have previously done, the hydrangea.  These look so realistic, I just LOVE them!

Lastly, the Lemon Blackberry.. a basic lemon cupcake topped with Blackberry buttercream (new to me and a perfect summertime frosting).  I decided to try a new flower design for this one, something I had not done previously but have seen a lot.  They sometimes refer to it as a 'fantasy flower'.. it's about 3 layers of piped petals on top of the cupcake (using a petal tip of course).  I LOVED the way this one turned out.. though my blackberry buttercream was a little soft for this design (I had to keep refrigerating it while working).. they still turned out beautiful!

Here are some pics of the completed cupcakes on my cupcake tower at the party (I wish I thought to do individual shots of each but oh well.. you get the idea)  ..Michaela loved them and I received many compliments on them as well :)

Cupcake Signage.. I find this to be very helpful when there are a lot of people at an event.. saves me (or the hosts) from having to describe flavors all day long!    

 My best close-up shot of the different 'flowers'

 The Cupcake Tower!