Rainbows and Unicorns

Angela requested a cake and cake pops for her daughter, Elliana's 7th birthday party.  I got the invitation via email and my head nearly exploded from pure glee.  Check out this invite!!!

My 7-year old self was absolutely ecstatic to start on this cake and cake pops.  Angela requested a rainbow colored cake on the inside and a unicorn on the outside.  Sha!

So the first thing I did was make the cake pops.  Rainbow, of course.

Then I made a TON of cakes.  Purple.

Blue.

Green.

Yellow.  

Orange.  

Red.

And here's the beautiful stack of colorful goodness.  Mmmmm!

Here's Elliana's cake.  I tried to incorporate as many of the design elements from the invite as I could.  OF COURSE I had the unicorn featured on the front of the cake.  All purple and happy.  With number 7 on her.  

Here's what the cake looked like at its final destination.  What cool water bottles!

Here's Elliana enjoying a slice of her rainbow cake.  What a neat unicorn head band!  I've never seen anything like it!  I want one.  

Check that out!!!   The colors turned out great!

Happy 7th birthday, Elliana!  If I was 7 years old, I know that we'd be great friends!  :)

Coral Ombre

Chelsie was a lucky winner from my Cake Mama Cakes Birthday Giveaway last Fall.  She wanted to "cash in" her prize for a birthday cake for herself.  I couldn't think of a better way to celebrate!

Chelsie wanted to try the chocolate-flecked cake that has very quickly become a client favorite.  I used a regular vanilla buttercream filling and I decorated the outside of this beautiful cake with a smooth, delicious real vanilla bean boiled buttercream.  I think the shading turned out beautifully. 

If you look closely enough, you can actually see the flecks from the vanilla bean.  Mmmmm!

Happiest of birthdays to you, Chelsie!!  

S'mores Bites

Looking for something super easy and fun to serve at your New Year's Party?  Why not try some S'mores bites?  They are so simple, fast and oh so good!!!

Here's how easy they are:

Step one:  Melt some chocolate.  I use my Wilton Candy Pro to do the job.
Step two:  Skewer a large marshmallow.  I used Jet Puffed marshmallows but have made these with homemade marshmallows before and those are awesome as well!

Step three:  Dip the marshmallow into the melted chocolate.

Step four:  Roll into some crushed graham crackers.

Step five:  Remove from skewer and place on waxed paper to cool and harden.

Step six:  Enjoy!!!

These make a great addition to any cookie/candy tray over the holidays or for any occasion!  Have fun!!

Happy Birthday, Tanner!

My godson Tanner's invite came in the mail.  Lots of gold.  Lots of class.  Then he sent over some pictures of cakes that he'd like for the occasion.  Again, gold painted fondant with a lot of sophistication and two tiers.  I was game.  

Tanner gave me freedom to do something new for the cake flavors and I took advantage of that to try something I'd been wanting to try for a while.  S'Mores cake.  I took a chocolate cake and topped the first layer with chocolate fudge filling and graham crackers, then I stacked some more cake and topped that with marshmallow fluff, and then I did another with fudge and graham crackers.  I couldn't wait to see and taste how it would turn out.  

 

The top tier of the cake was chocolate flecked cake with buttercream filling.  It's such a crowd pleaser! But Tanner's favorite cake flavor is banana, so I threw in some banana cake pops, all decorated for this fancy party.

Here's how they both turned out.  I used a gold edible food spray to spray "paint" the fondant on the cakes.  I added some edible food glitter to sparkle it up a little.

 

And here's the birthday boy!

 

 Gold candles look great on the cake!

Happy Birthday, Tanner!  And thanks so much for letting me explore a fun new flavor!  Doesn't that look delicious?!!!

 

Best wishes for another GREAT year, Tanner!  With even more exciting new things on the horizon, I can't imagine anything less!

Love,

Ann

It's a Cookie Swap!

My friend Erin and her sister Kristi hosted a cookie swap tonight.  What a WONDERFUL way to stock up on some FABULOUS Christmas cookies for all of the holiday entertaining we have coming up.   Here's a sampling of what we got to take home tonight.   

The Reese's peanut butter ones were mine.  Those are MY favorite.

Josie and Mara had a great time decorating a Gingerbread house!  This was an awesome project for the girls.  Thanks again for thinking of them, Erin!

Here are all of the bakers!  What a great turn-out and SUCH a fun party!!!

After a wonderful snack-filled dinner, complete with hot chocolate, Erin and Kristi supplied boxes and festive waxed paper for their guests to take their goodies home and Erin gave us all a Christmas CD of her favorite Christmas tunes and a jar of her homemade jam.  

Honestly, it was so awesome to be so spoiled!!!

Merry Christmas to you all!!!!!