Here is a picture of the cake at the reception. When I was making the cake I commented that it would look nice with white lights and tulle around it. I had to smile when we delivered the cake because the table for the cake was set up just like I had mentioned.
For this cake I was asked to make a simple winter theme with snowmen on a 9x13 cake. Here's what I came up with. The poinsettia on the cake is made of gum paste. This was my first try at a gum paste poinsettia. I wanted to practice since I have a poinsettia wedding cake due just after Christmas.
For this cake I got to use my 1st impressions baby mold- which I have been anxiously waiting to use. I think it came out really cute. I made the owl out of rice krispie treats so that it would be sturdier since the cake had to be transported quite a distance. 
I've always thought quilted cakes were very pretty but I never tried to make one until now. I think it came out really great. It was much easier than I expected too. I bought a cutter that you just press into the side of the cake and it makes 3 diamonds, then you just keep rotating the cake and pressing in the cutter. I put silver dragees at the corner of each diamond. The topper and the roses are gumpaste. This has to be one of my favorite cakes!
I was asked to make a cake for a graduation with the theme of "grown up little girl", Steelers fan and moving to Pittsburgh. It took quite a lot of thinking and discussion with family to come up with an idea. They specifically wanted a book so I made it in pink to reflect the grown up little girl theme. You can't really tell in the picture but the book has flowers piped onto the cover. The Steelers pennant is hand painted. I think it came out OK. The suitcase is to represent moving. It must look pretty realistic because Katie tried to pick it up by the handle. I must admit that I freaked out for a minute when she ripped the handle off the cake and broke it in half. I managed to fix it and I think it looks alright. Hope they like the cake!
I made these graduation hat cupcakes to go with a graduation cake. They are made from little peanut buttercups and square chocolates.
I keep getting requests for this same style of graduation cake. I tried to make the math book look like an old leather binding. There are a few cracks in the fondant which makes it look an old leather book. Of course this cake is white almond with raspberry filling- a favorite with everyone!
Last night the kids wanted to take something to their teachers as a thank you gift. I just happened to have two 6 inch white almond cakes on hand so we quickly decorated them for the teachers. I sent the cakes to school on the bus. Hopefully we don't have two white almond cakes on the bus floor!
For this cake I tried brush embroidery. I read about it in a cake book and watched a demo online. It really was pretty easy. I think that it came out nicely. In the end this cake reminded me of a piece of fabric that I had been given so I thought it was only fitting to use the fabric as a back ground for the picture. I think brush embroidery would look good in colored icing but the customer wanted black and white for a more "over the hill" type of look.
I am really happy with the way this turned out. I tried to do a cowboy theme at the bottom and space theme toward the top. My only problem with the cake is that Zurg kept wanting to fall over. I popped him onto a blob of fondant and he seems to be staying put- at least for now.
I made the princesses skirt using half of the ball pan and a round cake. I put the ball cake on the round cake and trimmed the round cake to fit and then covered it with fondant. Her torso and head are mm fondant. I frosted the 1 with butter cream. It is really hard to frost a chocolate cake without having crumbs show. I tried to place the flowers on the cake everywhere I saw a big chocolate cake crumb. Thank goodness for the flowers to cover my imperfections.
I have mixed feelings about this cake. I love the hat. It is very realistic-which I like. I used a stitching tool, normally used for sewing, to make the stitching lines on the hat. The back of the hat is super great too. I covered the cake board with fondant to make it look like a baseball diamond. I was going to put a ribbon around the cake board but then I decided to let the wood show. I like the rustic look of the wood. I really don't like the ball too much. I tried to get it round. I even bought Wilton's ball pan but still it is not perfectly round. The pan instructions called for putting stars all over the ball. Had I done that I may have been able to cover my imperfections more easily.
I like this jungle cake much better than the first jungle cake that I made. It could use a few more animals. I wanted to put a giraffe on the cake but my Katie took a big bite out of it so of course I couldn't put it on the cake!
The butterflies on this cake were a new technique that I tried. I bought the butterfly cutters last summer and I have been waiting for the right cake to try them on. I really like how they came out.
