I'm Baaaccckkkkk!!!!!

I must say, I'm not a very good blogger.  I start with good intentions and then other things just come up.....a lot of other things just come up. Like fixing supper or helping with homework or doing laundry or Candy Crush Saga......you know, things. Well, before you know it, it's March....of the next year. So you see, I'm not a very good blogger.

It's been busy in the cake world. Well, in my cake world it has. Lots of weddings and birthdays and showers and well, you name it have happened since my last visit with you.

Do you know how many YouTube videos tutorials there are out there? I don't know the exact count, but there are TONS! How do I know this? When I'm asked to do a complex element on a cake, cookie, or cupcake, I first try cakecentral.com then I go to YouTube. A couple of my favorite video posters are Caljava and SweetWise. They are very good quality and they know what they are talking about!

I recently ordered The Mat from Caljava -- which is actually a SweetWise product. Caljava had a special. Those things are absolutely WONDERFUL! I wish I would've ordered the pro mat since it has measurement markings on it. Oh well, sometime I will. I'm also loving Fondex Elite fondant -- which is a Caljava product that I ordered from SweetWise.....because they were having a sale. My days of rolling out fondant on the table are long gone.

Now I just wish they would start making the bigger SILpin rolling pins again.....

I thought I would share some of the cakes I have done since we last visited.....

 I made this one using "The Mat". I just can't believe how easy it is to cover a cake with it. LOVE IT!

 And how about these Valentine cookies? I hadn't done any cookies in quite a while and these were so much fun! So glad my friend Chassity called to order a cookie bouquet for her new husband! Hope he loved it!

 I love this zebra print cake. Made this for a special friend's daughter. Zebra print is very popular!

What can I say? It's an armadillo! There's a great story behind it. An old friend from high school, who I haven't seen since graduation night 29 years ago, contacted me through Facebook. She said her daughter was celebrating her 27th birthday (WHAT?! -- for the record, I'm surely not old enough to have kids that age). Anyway, she said she started working on one but she thought she was getting in over her head and asked if I would. I have never made an armadillo before so I said, "Sure! I can do that!". Well, I'm glad I did! It was a lot of fun! After I was finished, I had it sitting on my counter. Every time I turned to look at it, I swore the thing was going to move. Even my daughter said she thought it was looking at her. Donna loved her cake, she hasn't changed a bit in 29 years, and I'm so glad she asked me to do it.

I was asked to make this cake for a couple from my hometown who were celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary. (That doesn't seem possible either!) No, I wasn't at the wedding. I did, however, go to school with a couple of their children. I was very honored that Karen and Bill asked me to do their cake. I've known them all my life. The poinsettias were great fun! Once again, Jennifer Dontz came to my rescue! It's so exciting to get a phone call from a well-known cake artist! I get all giddy and I'm sure I sounded like an idiot on the phone. I think they turned out rather nice, don't you?

I love making daisies! I was so glad when Heather asked me to do her wedding reception cake. She wanted gerbera daisies. These flowers matched her decorations. I did something similar for her shower only it was a sheet cake. 

Well, it's time to go check the laundry and it's late. I really don't like daylight savings time coming this early! Thank you for stopping by and checking out my ramblings. Maybe it won't be as long the next time.....

Wedding Cakes....

It's June. Actually it's getting close to the end of June. June has been a busy month.....it's wedding month.

Of the four Saturdays in June, three of those weekends were wedding cake weekends.

One of them booked me over a year in advance. Can you believe that? They wanted ME to do their wedding cake and called me over a YEAR in advance.....well, I can't believe it....actually, I feel honored. Honored. Honored that someone wants ME to create the cake that will live on in their minds and pictures for the rest of their lives. It's very humbling.....and nerve-wracking if I stop and think about it. I mean, this thing has got to be good. Not only does it have to look good, it has to taste good......and well constructed....

A couple weeks ago, I did a three tier fondant-covered cake with lace. As soon as the bride sent me the picture I got all excited. (This is the year in advance booking.) She had found it on the Martha Stewart website. I had never done lace before.....a new technique.....and a need for new cake toys! (My husband just shakes his head...)

The cake in the picture was gorgeous. I can't tell you how many times I tried to expand the picture so I could see the detail of the lace. Then I would go on the internet and pour over the online stores and call my friend Melody who, by the way, owns a cake decorating/party supply store that I frequent -- a lot. We couldn't find the exact lace molds. We could get close, but I knew that those specific molds had to be out there somewhere.

Then I had an idea! I'll post the picture on cakecentral.com and surely somebody there would know which direction to point me. Well, they didn't let me down. The response was almost immediate! The poster pointed me to Sugar Delites (jenniferdontz.com).

I must say, I love Jennifer and Sugar Delites. She got me through this cake.....I emailed her a question about a frill cutter and she called me the next day.

I now use her recipes for white chocolate fondant and pearl clay. Love, love, love them! I also ordered a couple of her videos....WOW! I'm going to gradually get the whole collection....sshhhhh....don't tell my husband.....

I am a bit of a perfectionist....I take after my daddy.....so I get it honest....

I re-did the frill strip on the top tier three times.....to be honest, I still wasn't satisfied.....but that's me....

Wanna see it?

Well, here's the finished product....

What do you think?

I think it turned out pretty darn good.....I'm hoping Kaitlyn started a trend.....love that lace!

By the way, I didn't make the flowers on top.......those are silk hydrangea on the top. Aren't they beautiful?

Wanna see some other weddings I've done? Take a look....I didn't do all of these this month.....these are the some of the ones I've done in the past 9 or 10 months.....

Thanks for stopping by and looking.....

Beginnings and Rainbows

Today marks a new day in blogging for me. Gonna try to jump into this thing again.....

I have another blog. It contains my musings of my day job....well, what was my job. Now it's part of my job....at least until someone tells me differently. I just haven't posted since 2008. Yup, one of those back burner things. I know people who blog and I enjoy reading their posts. Wonder if anyone will enjoy reading my posts....hmmmm.....

So here I go, starting a new blog. This time it's about one of my passions. I have a lot of those.....

Anyway, this one is about my cake decorating.

I love cake decorating. I love it so much I even teach classes. I don't just decorate cakes. I also decorate cookies and cupcakes.

Cake decorating can be a bundle of fun or a nightmare.

I've had nightmares about cakes. I've laid awake at night worried about how I'm going to pull things off. Wonder if Duff or Buddy or Bronwen or Sylvia or Mike have ever woken up in the middle of the night wondering how they will pull something off........well, I do and I'm not a celebrity by any means.

My latest thinker cake was a dolphin cake. How was I going to make a dolphin-shaped cake with enough servings? Well, I decided I was just going to stop thinking about it and do it. It wasn't that difficult....I was stressing over something that I shouldn't have been stressing over.....I do stuff like that....

So here's the dolphin.....see, silly to stress over...

I've had quite a busy weekend though. Wedding cake, cookies, that dolphin, and now I'm working on a cake for tomorrow. The birthday girl requested a sheet cake with a horseshoe and barbed wire.....and rainbow cake in the middle. What a fun thing! Rainbow cake. Here's a before baking picture....

Kinda messy looking, isn't it? These are fun because no two ever turn out the same and everybody's serving has a different pattern. I always try to remember to ask the person I make one for to send me a picture of the inside. That fascinates me.....the littlest things amuse me.....:)

Here's what it looked like after it was baked and leveled....

Pretty cool, huh? Can you see the blue peeking out there? Now I've gotta remember to ask my friend Linda to take a picture of it when they cut it.....