Aimee's 8th Birthday

Well our little friend Aimee (a neighbour of ours) who had in summer requested the Lemon aid cake, is turning 8.  Her birthday is actually the day after Christmas (a little Christmas baby) and her parents threw her a birthday party on the 18th.  They were having "Tea with Mrs. Claus" in a tea room in Streetsville, how cool is that.  Mel & I were asked to do her cake and keeping with the theme of tea, a teapot was definitely in order.  We were asked to make it whimsical and we really wanted to keep it a birthday theme as opposed to Christmas but added just a touch of Christmas here and there. The base cake and the teapot were vanilla cake filled with chocolate fudge buttercream. Aimee's favourite.  The teapot is covered in fondant and all the details are made from fondant as well.  The base is draped loosely with white fondant to resemble a tablecloth and this is where we added a bit of Christmas.  We hand painted Christmas ornaments on the table cloth.  Then we added a little dish of gingerbread men and the whole cake and teapot were sprayed with an edible glitter. Here's a picture of our little teapot for Aimee;

The feedback from Aimee's mom was great.  Everyone loved the cake and Aimee was delighted with it!

Happy Birthday Aimee!

65th Birthday

After the truck we had 2 cakes to have ready for Saturday.  One being for one of Mel's friends dad who was turning 65.  They asked for a vegan choc cake with strawberry cream filling and the theme was to depict their dad's profession as a landscaper.  Here is what we came up with;

Mel did an amazing job of creating a miniture lawn mower and wheel barrel out of fondant. All details are made from fondant and a little tinted piping gel for the water feature. We had fun making this one. Turned out quite good and we got a great response, the cake was a success in both looks and taste.

Keep them trucker's rolling......

Now 2nd on our list was a huge challenge for us.  I think my BFF, Marisa, thinks we are the cake bosses of our neighbourhood, haha.  Marisa works for a Steel Company and they were having a celebration of sorts and wanted to surprise their boss.  She asked if we could make a "Truck", okay we're talking a big rig truck. She sent us pictures of one of their trucks and asked if we could make something similar.  So we set out our plan.  I had my hubby cut out a 19"x6" board for the trailer, some 2"x2" blocks for support and wheel placements and another board for the bottom base of 30" x 12".  We glued the pieces all together and covered it with foil.  The truck consists of 2 parts.  The cab is 2 x 6" square cakes filled and stacked with another 1/2 of a 6" square for the drivers part of the cab.  We made the cab vanilla cake with a layer of strawberry jam and topped with strawberry cream filling.  The trailer was chocolate cake with mocha cream filling and consisted of cakes making it 18" long x 6" high by 6" wide. 3 layers of cake with filling.  The whole truck was covered in black fondant with silver accents.  This cake weight a lot.  Here are pictures of the truck the 2nd time around.

When I say 2nd time around, well my worst nightmare came to play on this cake.  When I said it weighed a lot, I meant it.  I decided to carried this cake to the garage which was the coldest place I could think of since it didn't fit my refrigerator.  Picture it, 2:00am when I finally finished the last details, Mel had gone home around 11:00, hubby went to bed and the cake is due 7:15am on site later that morning.  Being tired and clearly not thinking this out I proceeded to carry this cake to the garage where I took a tumble with cake in hand.  I think I took the worst of the fall as I managed to keep the cake in tact other than the cosmetics of it.  Well I was lucky enough that the celebration event could be postponed til the next morning as Mel & I had some repairing to do the next evening.  It arrived safe and sound (a day late) and it was a huge success.  Thanks Marisa for her patience and the confidence displayed by giving us this challenge.



Dylan's birthday

Well we have some catching up to do.  The past week or so Mel & I have been super busy.  1st on our list of cakes is a "PS3" requested for Dylan's birthday.  If you are like me you are probably asking what is PS3? well it stands for "PlayStation 3". We started off with Mel drafting a template for the hand control. The game unit is very simple as it is very basic.  Dylan's dad asked us to make it a chocolate cake, Dylan's favourite, but was unsure of the filling.  We took a wild guess and hit the mark with a cookies and cream filling.  Dylan an his dad picked up the cake and you know you scored when Dylan looks at the cake and says; Awesome!.  He even got a taste before hand from the cake left over when carving the hand control.  Here's a picture of the cake;

Since the PS3 is all black it is difficult to see all details clearly.  The pictures don't do it justice and all that really matters it that the birthday boy loved the cake. 

 Happy Birthday Dylan!

I love weddings!

Hi everyone.  I just dropped off a wedding cake, well actually it is a dummy wedding cake.  A couple of weeks ago I met Beena in the grocery store who just happens to be a wedding planner. She saw all the baking goods I was buying and started asking questions.  Then she handed me a business card and told me she would be interested in using my cakes as part of her wedding packages.  WOW!!! I was floored but she asked me to provide a sample wedding cake to show her what we can do.  She loved it!!! and has now asked that I do another sample cake suitable for Sweet 16 birthdays.  It seems she has been getting a lot of business in the planning of sweet 16 parties.  Well here is the sample wedding cake I gave her and I will be posting again in the next few days with a picture of yet another dummy cake.  Sorry for the quality of the picture....I really have to invest in a better camera.......

All details on this cake is made with fondant except for the roses and the rose petals which are made with gum paste.  Hope you like it.  Until the next.......take care.

50 and still sexy!

Well it's been a while since I last posted anything.  I just finished putting together a cake for my sister-in-law's 50th birthday party tonight.  She doesn't know anything about the party since it's a surprise party, I'm not worried about her finding out by reading my blog since she's one of the last few without a computer. Her boyfriend asked me a couple of weeks ago if I'd make her a birthday cake and if you know me at all you know I would say definitely I would make Susie a cake.  I've always wanted to try making a gum paste shoe so I thought this would be the perfect opportunity.  Here's a picture of my 1st gum paste shoe still in the drying stages;

Not bad for my 1st try.......I had a little trouble with the heal but all in all it turned out okay.  I used this as the inspiration for Susie's 50th birthday cake.  So what goes with a shoe?  A shoe box perhaps and possibly a handbag or clutch?  Then a few tweaks here and there, add a little bling and you've got yourself a themed birthday cake.  Here's a picture of the completed cake;

I think it turned out pretty.  I hadn't made a rose in a while so I thought hey gotta practice, and voila....I haven't lost my touch. Call me crazy but I love making roses.  So I decided to use them on Susie's cake, I topped the shoe box off with a bow, added a nice big "50" just in case someone didn't know her age, a butterfly here and there........not bad.  Though I know there are mistakes I made.  I thought the handbag would give me problems, oh noooooo, damn...the shoe box did! Couldn't get it smooth for the life of me, go figure....straight edges and all but not to worry a little deco on the box here and there helps hide those little booboos.  But damn I know they're there!!!!!! 
On to the good stuff, the cakes.  The shoe box is a red velvet cake with a butter cream cheese filling spiked with a little Bailey's Irish Cream, yum! Can't wait to have a piece of that tonight. The hand bag is a vanilla pound cake with strawberry jam topped with cream cheese filling, oooh!   The handbag is covered with black fondant which I imprinted with a flower pattern, the handle is fondant balls strung on wire. And if you look close, the clasp on the handbag is an "S" for Susie. The shoe box is covered in hot pink and black fondant and a little spray of edible glitter adds a little sparkle. Here's a close up of one of my roses & the bow;

All in all I think Susie will be thrilled with the cake.  Well gotta go get ready for the party tonight.....gonna have some fun.  Welcome to the fifties club Sue, LOL.  Happy Birthday and many more!

Jackson turns 1!!!!!!

It has been a year since my pride and joy entered this world, my little darling grandson has turned 1 year old!!! Wow time flies.  Jackson is Mel's son and he is the cutest little guy and of course the love of my life!  Well this little guy is one lucky birthday boy as he actually had 4 birthday parties, huh!  His birthday was on 29Oct10 which happened to be a Friday this year and since mostly everyone works and by the time they would make it out to his party it would be Jackson's bedtime. So the party would have to wait. But as Grandparents we did manage a visit on his actual birthday for coffee and cake and of course Nonna (me) had to make him a birthday cake. 





















Isn't Jackson the cutiest thing!!!! I know I may be bias since he is my grandson but come on, he is the cutest baby EVER!!!!  So the teddy bear is the 1st cake........my first attempt at using this teddy bear pan.  I received it last Christmas as a gift from my nephew David, (love you David).  He got my name in the Kris Kringle game we played and thought I'd love the pan and I do!!!  But I never got a chance to try it out and thought this would be the perfect opportunity.  I used the cake recipe that came with the pan which was a basic vanilla cake and I filled it with chocolate fudge frosting which sort of glued the 2 halves together.  Since I had lots of choc fudge frosting I thought I'd use it for the fur BUT a lesson for the wise, never use choc fudge frosting for this type of application.  It softened up in the piping bag from the heat of my hand and I had to keep stopping, putting it all in the fridge to cool and then continue, which took a lot longer than normal. But I think it turned out cute.
Now the following day, the 30th of October, we had another milestone, my niece Alexandra celebrated her Sweet 16. HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALEX!!!  Her parents threw her a fabulous party which of course we all attended and had a great time!!!  so Mel & Phil decided to throw Jackson's birthday party the following weekend. He actually had 3 parties over the course of this weekend.  So what does that mean.......well other than he is one lucky little boy, Mel and I had to make 3 cakes........Yup that's right 3, count 'em, THREE cakes!!!!!  She had a party with all his little friends at "Balls of Fun" Saturday morning and then later in the day we had a family birthday party with all of our side of the family........we're just too big of a family to have both sides of the family together and then Sunday afternoon it was Phil's side of the family. (insert sigh here....for sheer exhaustion!)
Back to the cakes........Mel & I were up until 2:15am Saturday morning to complete the 3 cakes and guess who forgot to take a picture of the cake for the kids party.....moi......but all 3 cakes were the same or sort of the same.  Here's picture of last night's cake.

We should have added more to it, it sort of looks a little bare in the front but talk about exhaustion.  The base was a layer of choc and a layer of vanilla cake with choc fudge frosting for the filling, topped with butter cream frosting for the grass.  The soccer ball was choc cake and the baseball and golf ball were vanilla  cake all covered in white fondant and decorated in fondant.  The baseball cap and the #1 were done in gum paste.  I guess Jackson really has no choice but to like sports, let's see.....his dad loves and plays soccer, his mom loves and plays baseball and his grandfather (my hubby) loves ALL sports but plays a lot of golf.......it will be interesting to see what Jackson will prefer as he gets older.  What ever you choose honey, I'll be there to watch and cheer you on!!!! Love you Jacks!!!!!  

Happy 1st Birthday my darling!!!!
me & Jacks Oct 2010





Home Run Sports!!!!

Mel & I were going through some pictures of cakes we have created in the exciting past year of decorating. We came across one we did this past summer for a friend of Mel's that opened a baseball sports store and thought we'd like to share this one with you.  He had asked Mel if we could make a cake for his grand opening. This was a great honour to be asked to make a cake for such an important event for Tony.  And as we are both big baseball fans, and Mel still plays, we were thrilled to be a part of Tony's Grand Opening. Here's a picture of the cake we came up with;

This was quite a challenge for us as the cake had to be huge.  We started by making slabs of vanilla cake, which when put together was a 2 ft by 3 ft base. We covered it in butter cream and then put a 12"x 12" chocolate cake on top to make our field.  That's alot of cake!!!  This was all butter cream other than the baseballs  and the lettering which we made from fondant. In order to transport this cake we actually had to build a base from 2x4's which we nailed into cake boards.  HEAVY wasn't the word.......we definitely felt like the cake boss on this one, LOL.  Was well worth the experience! Tony and his staff loved it and the store is going strong!  Congrats Tony!

Reese's 3rd Birthday!

Hi! Mel here, so when I was asked to do a 3rd birthday cake for Reese, I knew I had to go straight to Reese who is a true princess and ask her what she wanted for her birthday cake. She told me that she wanted a "Pink Tinkerbell Cake". So, I figured I would do a character cake. I found a Tinkerbell character cake pan, and upon inspection, I realized that there is nothing pink on Tinkerbell  :(  So I thought I was stuck... Reese said she wanted "PINK". So I decided on making a vanilla cake and adding pink food colouring to make it a "pink Tinkerbell cake!" Great idea, right! Well it was well worth the idea when seeing Reese's face when she saw her cake and then cut into it to find a pink cake, well that alone was worth making this cake.  This was my 1st character cake, and it was fun to make just watching it come to life as I added details.  Reese was thrilled with her cake as was her mom and family.  Mom and I agreed that for a 1st character cake it turned out quite nicely.  Here's a picture of "Tink".

 

                        

                         Happy 3rd Birthday Reese! 

Richard's 13th Birthday

Another birthday cake......don't you just love birthdays!  This was the 2nd cake required this past week, actually delivered yesterday for Richard's birthday party.  Richard's mom Marisol, dear friend and neighbour, asked me to make Richard's cake and of course we were honoured to make it.  There were to be 10 boys at this party and Richard wanted a cake to resemble the X-box control.  I don't even know what an X-box looks like, LOL but thankfully for Mel and of course "google", hahaha, we were able to draft a template.  We made all the knobs and buttons on the X-box as 3D and placed the X-box on a base cake.  Here is what we came up with;

The cake is choc fudge and the bottom is filled with cookies & cream filling covered in fondant. The X-box is choc fudge cake carved with the great template Mel made and all the knobs, buttons and lettering are made with fondant.

Happy Birthday Richard and thanks for enlightening me as to what an X-box is, LOL.

We had fun making this one.

Gabe's 30th Birthday

This past week was a busy one for us. Me working 5 days a week and coming home to bake & decorate and Mel with the little guy, soon to be 1, well he keeps her jumping. So 2 cakes required back to back is considered a busy week for us.  This 1st cake we did was required for a friend's son Gabriele who is turning 30.  Gabe's mom Lina offered to look after getting the cake for the party and wonderfully enough she asked us to make it for Gabe.  She had decided to go with a beer theme. She wanted to mugs clinking together for cheers which had to serve 30-40 people.  Here's what we came up with;

                                      

The base cake is one choc and one vanilla filled with choc mousse, yum!!!  Covered in fondant and the 2 beer mugs are cake as well, one choc and one vanilla.  The beer is melted carmel added to piping gel with a little brown food colouring.  The pretzels and peanuts are made from fondant. I place the edible Heineken and Moosehead labels around the base of the cake and I must have been leaning to the left cause if look at them they are all off and more to the left.  Should have measured!!!!  Oh well, ya think anybody noticed, LOL.  Happy 30th Gabe.......hope you enjoyed your cake!

Adriana's 1st Birthday

This morning we completed a birthday cake for Mel's neighbour's little girl who turned one. They were celebrating Adriana's 1st birthday at Downy's Farms for a fun filled morning at the petting zoo, pumpkin patch and a hay ride among other exciting things.  So in keeping with the farm theme Adriana's mom Stephanie wanted a cake with farm animals.  She saw one online that she liked and thanks to "The Pink Cake Box" we got our inspiration.  All the animals are made from fondant along with the flowers, etc. except for the topper's on the cake.  These larger animals and the # 1 were made from gum paste.  The fence was made with choc fondant, yum!  The 10" bottom tier is alternating layers of choc and vanilla cake with cookies & cream filling and the top 6" is a choc vegan cake with strawberry cream.  Both tiers are covered in pale green fondant.

Mel & I had so much fun making this cake and when Mel delivered it today Adriana's mommy & daddy were thrilled as were the guests. And according to Mel, Jackson had a fabulous time at Downy's farm with Adriana.  Happy 1st birthday Adriana!

Gabriela's 15th

Hi it's just me again, Mary. As I mentioned before this weekend was a busy one for us, we had 3 cakes to do.  Here is the 2nd one I did. It was for my neighbour's daughter who turns 15 tomorrow. She had a few friends over celebrating today and I was honoured to be asked to make the cake for her special day.

The cake is an 8" choc fudge with strawberry cream filling using fresh strawberries.  Covered in white fondant and the monogramed trinket box, daisies, #15 and bow are made with gum paste in Gabriela's favourite colour, purple.  I made the decorations in various diff shades and you can't tell from the pictures but I dusted the cake and deco with edible glitter. I think it turned out pretty sweet.  Margaret, Gabriela's mom loved it.  I hope Gabriela did too!  Happy Birthday Gabriela. 

Cameron's 5th Birthday

It's a busy weekend, 3 cakes to get done. One of the cakes was for Cameron, who is the grandson of my dear friend, Pat. She wanted to do something special for her little pride and joy on his 5th birthday.  She told me that Cameron just loved dirt bikes and especially ATVs. 

I made a double layer chocolate fudge cake, as chocolate is Cameron's favourite, and a simple vanilla butter cream filling with mini chocolate chips. Sound familiar, this flavour seems to be a hit with the little ones. 

Have a look at what I came up with;

I started off by buying a couple little ATVs at Walmart.  This way Cameron has a memento of his birthday cake and a couple of new toys to play with. 

After I filled the cake I did a little carving. Nothing much, I just wanted to make the cake look like rough terrain.  The pieces I cut off here and there I simply applied to different parts on top of the cake and I even dug out a small hole where the centre curve of the 5 would be for my pond.  Then I crumb coated it and covered it in green fondant.  When I finished covering the cake I stepped back to take a look and  it appeared like there were hills and valleys, which is what I was trying to achieve.  I cut out a # 5 out of brown fondant and to use for my road. I have to admit I got this idea from a cake I saw on line, but I changed ti to make it my own. Now since it's suppose to be a dirt road I covered the 5 with crushed choc chip cookies.  Choc chip cookies worked well because of the variation in colour due to the chips.  I had made the rocks ahead of time from gum paste/fondant mixed. The trees are made from fondant and the bushes are small pieces of fondant with piped icing.  I had so much fun making this cake. 

When Pat came by earlier today to pick up the cake she brought Cameron along with her.  The best part of making cakes is seeing the faces of the people picking them up especially the little ones.  Cameron's comment said it all for me "WOW, it's so cool!"  He couldn't wait to go home and eat his cake.

                                    

Well Cameron you made my day.  I wish you the happiest of birthdays!