Poinsettia Cake

I wanted to make a nice dessert for my Christmas Day dinner with my family. My Grandma was in town and she takes an interest in the cakes that I make and I wanted to make an extra special one for her.

The most Christmas-y flower I could think of was a poinsettia. So, I taught myself how to make the flower out of royal icing and am really pleased with how they turned out. I don't think this could have been any more Christmas-y!

I used the cake, which was a carrot cake with cream cheese filling and frosting, as my centerpiece for the meal. Color flow decorated cut-out cookies were the name cards. It was a baker's delight!

The cake was a very nice end to our Christmas meal. I'm happy that I was able to squeeze this one into my busy Christmas celebration. :)

I hope you've all had a fantastic Christmas and wish you all a Happy New Year!

Christmas is for Kids

A few months ago, one of my cake gift certificates was put up in a silent auction at Shorewest Realtors that benefitted Christmas is for Kids. The winner, Patty, placed an order almost immediately for a Christmas cake to celebrate with her family.

Patty requested a chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream filling and she requested that it "look like a present." Here's what I delivered today!

Merry Christmas, Everyone!

The Little Mermaid

Danielle, Payton's mom, asked me to make a cake for Payton's 3rd birthday party. Evidently, this little soon-to-be 3-year old was a huge fan of Ariel, the Little Mermaid. I was excited to take this cake on as, like I stated in an earlier post, Ariel is my favorite Disney princess!

Danielle requested a chocolate cake with raspberry buttercream filling. I decided to cover the cake with more buttercream and use the fondant for fun underwater accents.

The Ariel you see on the top of the cake is a doll I picked up from the toy store. Instead of spending the time molding her out of gum paste, I thought it best to include the toy. It's something Payton can play with for many months to come (and she came with a change of clothes!! What fun!).

I hope that Payton had a wonderful 3rd birthday party! I'm sure Ariel is happy in her new home.

Gingerbread Creations

This time of year is usually a little slow in the "cake department". Many people are filling up on all of the Christmas goodies and cakes are taking a back seat. That's A-OK with me, as I use this time to do other things in the baked goods department.

One of my favorite things to do is make gingerbread houses. I made my very first one last year and fell in love with the process. It was wonderful to share the experience with my daughter and nephew and wanted to do that again this year. But to start out the season, Michael's had me do a Gingerbread House demo in November. The gingerbread house became part of the gingerbread display by the Wilton aisle. Looks good enough to eat!

A few weeks later, my daughter Josie and I made hers. I did all of the piping and she did all of the decorating. She's REALLY proud of her creation!

On St. Nick's Day, I was able to spend the morning with my nephew. He's a pretty big fan of trains and I found this train kit and thought it would make a fun project for us to do. Again, I did the piping, but Connor did ALL of the decorating! (His mom went out and bought some candy coal to put in the tender!)

And then this weekend, I taught a Gingerbread House Workshop at Ben Franklin Crafts. We had a wonderful turn-out with some delightful adults and kids alike. Actually, all of the kids were boys with TONS of creativity. Check out their masterpieces!

This one had a VERY cool Christmas tree on the back!

These boys had a Christmas tree, a penguin in a pond AND an igloo!

Fun trees made out of Tootie Rolls, a snowman made out of StarBursts, and a patio with a GRILL made these houses unique!!!

Wonderful Christmas lights and cheery wreath decorating this home!

Carol added small candies around the windows which made them look stained-glass. She also added "candles" in some of the windows for added whimsy.

I was able to get one done, too, and dropped it off for my mom. :)

Now that the gingerbread houses are done, I'd better get moving on the rest of the holiday baking. Happy Holidays!!!