Kristi's Baby Shower Cake

When I first found out that my friend Erin's sister was pregnant I said, "I'll make her baby shower cake!"  So this cake was a long time coming!  

Kristi's theme for the shower was absolutely adorable.  Her invites were rustic chic and she was going for a pink and gray theme.  I'm not doing it justice by explaining it.  It was so elegant and cute! Mason jars filled with baby's breath.  I mean, come on!!

Kristi was very clear that I could do whatever I wanted with the cake.  Of course I wanted her to like it and I know that she is a fan of white cake with vanilla frosting.  Her sister Erin said that nothing compares to Swiss Meringue Buttercream, so I opted for that.  The top and bottom tier were white cake and the middle tier was my favorite - chocolate!

I made the little booties on top out of gum paste.

Here's the cake at it's destination.  It looked perfectly "dressed" for the occasion!

Here's Kristi, the beautiful mother-to-be!  

Chocolate cake --- YUM!!!!

And to keep the festive flow, I added some pink sprinkles in the cake batter.  All of the frosting and filling was Swiss Meringue Buttercream.  

The day was absolutely perfect and Kristi's baby girl was welcomed so lovingly by all of Kristi's family and friends.  It was such a beautiful party!  We're so excited to meet your daughter!

Chocolate and Peanut Butter - OH MY GOODNESS!

My daughter loves all things chocolate and peanut butter.  Her cake was a no-brainer!  We actually found a Reese's chocolate cake in the bakery department of our local grocery store, but I couldn't buy a cake.  I'm the Cake Mama!!  So I looked at what the cake was and it was a chocolate cake with peanut butter mousse filling and chocolate frosting.  Okay.  I can totally do that!

I found this delicious recipe for Peanut Butter Mousse!  Oh my goodness - it was SO good!   My chocolate cake is my go-to - Ina Garten's Beatty's Chocolate Cake.  There is none better than this.  The chocolate frosting recipe was a really fun find - it spread so easily and tasted fantastic!!   And there you have it!  Topped with Reese's peanut butter cups and Reese's Pieces - she was SET!

Jo LOVES Peanut Butter Cups!!

We had Jo's party at pottery painting, glass art work place nearby.  Her friends all got to make glass pendants and it was a blast!

I can't believe she's a decade.  My how much we love her!

An Ursula Party

My daughters have both seemed to enjoy the villains in the Disney movies even more so than the Princesses.  As my oldest daughter once profoundly stated, "The heroes wouldn't be heroes if it weren't for the villains!"  True story.

So when my little Maren started showing an admiration (and fear...but mostly admiration) for Ursula from Disney's The Little Mermaid, we started to plan the party around this new love.

There are a lot of Little Mermaid cakes out there, but not so many for Ursula that weren't terribly scary!  LOL!  My girls are also both fans of the little plastic Tsum Tsums, so when designing her cake, I tried to incorporate an Ursula Tsum Tsum as the top tier.

To make things even more complicated, Maren said that she wanted a surprise party.  Now, she was turning 5 and this was a big deal...clearly.  So she told me that she wanted to be up in her room "crafting" while we assembled downstairs.  I would call for her to come downstairs and everyone would surprise her.  Now, this was HER plan.  She told ME this.  So on her birthday, we did exactly this.  Grandma and Grandpa came over, and Aunt and a good family friend all wished her a surprise happy birthday.

While it's EXACTLY what she wanted, I think she was hoping for a few more of her friends to celebrate with her.  She didn't say anything, but I could tell.  Little did she know here bigger surprise was coming up in two weeks with a whole Ursula theme!

All of her classmates and good friends from the neighborhood came to celebrate with her.  The surprise was EPIC!  And it made for a day she won't soon forget.

Happy Birthday, my dear 5 year old Maren.  My, how much you're loved!