Purple Puppy Dog Cake

This turned out to be one of my favorite cakes! I was given a picture and told to make a light purple cake to go with the adorable little dog on top. The cake was a simply done with a purple buttercream and just the little pup on top. Sometimes the simplest things turn out the best.

 

I had a picture of the puppy from the invite they used. I found another pic of a dog that would help me to make the different body parts of the dog. I rolled out the head and body first. I used a couple of toothpicks and water to stick them together. I added the legs and ears next—now it is starting to look like a dog! For the face pieces, I just sort of eyed it and did my best to make it look like the picture that she had sent me. I did put the purple collar on to connect the head and body. I put a little curled up tail on the back and it was almost done. Once I put on the finishing touches and added the bow and collar and it was all ready for the cake!

 

 

 

I loved this little cake. It was sweet and simple and just too cute with the puppy on top. Like I said, sometimes the simplest things turn out the best. Enjoy!!

 

Meg

Iced Butter Cookies

I do a TON of iced butter cookies. Fall brings cowbells and paw prints. Holidays bring holiday cookies. Add in the birthdays and baby showers and I can’t even begin to keep track with the amount of butter I have used!! Here are a few pics of the cookies I have done in the past few months.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Man, that is quite a few cookies! And that is not even all of them. I use my butter cookie recipe for all of my cookies. It is a butter cookie—not a sugar cookie. No eggs, no vanilla. Just butter, flour and sugar. I use a simple cookie frosting recipe for all of my piped cookies. I make it stiff to pipe on and thin it out to flood the cookies. I use a piping bag to outline and a bottle with the tip cut off to fill in the cookies. 

cookies are always a hit. They are quite time consuming. To bake, outline, fill and let set can take take days. But, when you are left with such a sweet end product, you just can’t go wrong. Everyone loves a cookie, and so far, these have been a hit around here. Enjoy!!

 

Meg

Monster Truck Cupcakes

I so love these cupcakes. They were super fun to make and came out too cute. I had never had an order for monster truck cupcakes and could not wait to get started on these! All the customer told me was that they had a bounce house with a monster truck on it—I got to take from there.

 

I used a small fluted cutter for the wheels. I added gumpaste to the fondant to make sure they would harden up.

 

I used the bottom of my jumbo icing tip to make the inner circle of the tire. They were all done in grey. It did not matter if they were hard, so there was no gumpaste added to these.

 

The windows were cut with the tiny square cutter. I cut one edge off to look like a window.

 

Once all of the pieces were cut out, they went on the truck bodies. I ordered a truck cutter and when I opened it, it was way too tiny. So, I traced my monster truck cookie cutter, scanned it and scaled it down to the right size. Then I cut out he copy. And then began the hand cutting of 40 monster truck bodies. Fun times. 

 

 

The pieces were a bit time consuming to get done, but totally easy to do. These were definitely monster sized cupcake toppers. I had a hard time even getting them to fit in the box! They were so stinking cute once they were all done. I loved doing these and can’t wait to do them again! Enjoy!!

 

 

 

 

 

Meg

Fondant Owls

Whoooo wouldn’t love these cupcakes??!? I know that owls are still all over the place. While I have not jumped on the owl bandwagon, I was super happy that I got to make something with owls on it.

I had an order a couple of weeks ago—I almost didn’t take it, but I figured I already had an order on Friday and two on Saturday, what was one more. She gave me a pic—I always like to have a pic to look at. I went from there and could not have been happier with the finished product!

 

These were actually way easier than I thought they would be. The hardest part was figuring out the wings. For the body, I used a tulip cutter. I cut off the middle point of the flower and the stem part with a knife. It made the perfect owl body.

 

 

To give the body some texture, I used a frosting tip to make marks. The bodies had dried out over night, but were still soft enough to make the marks.

Making these marks in the body gave the look of having feathers without having to add other pieces.

 

 

 

All of the little pieces for the owl were a tad bit time consuming, but easy to get done. I used a star cutter for the beaks—just cut the points off. I used one of my frosting tips for the eyes. The flowers for the ears were a medium blossom plunger cutter. I also used that same cutter for the feet, but cut off two of the petals.

The toughest part to figure out was the wings. I tried about five different kinds before I found the one I liked. I did petal cutters, ovals, leaf cutters and finally found the three petal cutter. I have had that one forever and never used it—now I can!! Just cut the petals apart, and you have some owl wings.

Once everything was cut out, it was time to assemble. A little bit of water and the owls came together in no time. The body was made with a mix of gumpaste so they would dry hard. The rest was all fondant. I used a blue confetti piece for the center of the eye. The flower on top was the little added touch these needed to be done.

 

The owls went on top of the cupcakes and were ready for the party! These were easier than I thought they would be and just too cute. I so hope that I will get more orders for owl cupcakes and cakes. Enjoy!

 

 

Meg

Super Bowl Cake

Tons of people will be getting together to watch the Super Bowl on Sunday. If you don’t watch the game, hopefully there will be some good eats for you to grub on. I had an order for a football themed cake for an office party this week. I loved how this turned out—it was just what I wanted it to look like. I love it when an idea for the cake actually turns out!

 

I did two 11×15 cakes for this one. I baked one, thinking that I would just split it and frost. But, the one cake was not as high as I wanted it to be, so I did another one. It got a layer of butter cream in the middle and was frosted with green around the outside. I loved the green—it was light without being too pale or so dark of a green that it would stain your mouth.

 

I used the grass tip to frost around the edges of the cake. I hate that tip. Really, really hate it. It seems to always clog up on me. I took forever, but I finally got the whole thing done. Then I had to do it all over again on the top.

 

I printed out a football on the computer and used that to trace and cut out the football on the brown fondant. I measured the white yard markers at about 1/4 inch. I loved the endzone signs. I cut the names with these rad little cookie cutters that I had—bought them forever ago and finally had a reason for them! I was going to pipe the lettering on the football, but at the last minute decided to cut them out of the tiny alphabet cutters-at 1:00 in the morning. That was a super bright idea. It was time consuming, but did look better than my piping skills at 1:00 in the morning do.

 

I loved, loved, loved this cake. It was fun to do and looked just exactly liked I wanted. I wish I had some for us to eat. We will be watching the game, but don’t have any cake! I guess that chips, dip and pizza will have to do for us.   Enjoy!!

 

 

 

 

Meg

Christening Cake

A sweet, simple cake for a sweet baby girl’s christening. This was my last order of the weekend. I had already done 3 dozen cupcakes with fondant toppers and 4 dozen iced cookies. I am trying not to take every order that comes in—after the fall craziness of baking nonstop, I want to take it easier. But, I just couldn’t pass this order up.

I always like doing something I have not done before. While this was not a complicated order, I had not done a christening cake before. I loved how this came out. I thought it looked like a christening cake without being overdone.

 

I have zero pics of the process. I always forget to take step by step shots when I have a bunch of orders.   She showed me a cross style that she liked for the top. I cut it out of card stock, put it on the fondant and cut the fondant with an exacto knife. Once I had it cut out, I used one of my impression mats to give it some texture. I wanted it to be a little different and thought that the swirl pattern was just perfect.

 

 

I used the same swirl mat on the border for the bottom of the cake. I rolled it out, cut it to the width I wanted and then pressed the mat on it. Then I went through and cut the top edge with my scallop cutter. I had it straight and thought that the scallop edge would be something else to dress the cake up.

 

I put a pearl design around the sides of the cake. I used a fondant tool to poke little dents in the cake. I put a dab of water in the holes and put white pearls in the dents. I was worried that they would pop out, but they stayed—even on the bumpy road to delivery!

 

 

 

My cakes are always three big layers of cake. It makes for a nice sized cake. For this order, she wanted an extra tall cake, so I added two more layers to it. It was crazy big—a 10inch, 5 layer cake. That would be a super slice of cake!

 

 

In the end, I was super happy with this cake. It was simple, but made a statement. I loved the whole look of it—the scalloped parts and the pearls came out just like I wanted. I am always pleasantly surprised when the finished product looks like the vision I had in my head. The customer was thrilled with the cake and that is the best part of any order. Enjoy!

 

 

 

Meg

Lego Cake

Who doesn’t love Legos? I would say that just about every kid had some Legos growing up—some adults still do. Legos are one of those great toys that has been around forever and will stay around forever. So, as long as there are Legos to play with, there will be Lego cakes!

I had an order for a Lego cake and Lego topped cupcakes. Man. There are some bad Lego cakes out there. I mean, really bad. So bad that I would not have even served them, much less taken a picture. The first thing I do is a search for cakes—it took awhile, but I found one I liked!

One of the best things about this cake was that I got to order a new baking toy. I get way too excited about new baking stuff.  I get all excited when I order them and all over again when it gets here. Living in a town with a Walmart and not much else, the internet is my source for all goodies.

 

The first thing you need for a lego cake is lego pieces. I used candy melts for them. I spooned it in the mold and tapped the mold to spread it around. The most important part is to keep tapping until bubbles start to come up. If you don’t do that, the tops of the legos will have air bubble holes in them. I made these a couple of days in advance and kept them in tupperware.

 

I used a white cake with buttercream for the cake and the cupcakes. The cake was frosted and smoothed, piped with a border and ready for legos!

 

 

 

 

 

I put some legos around the top and around the bottom of the cake. I figured that the pieces were too heavy to put on the sides of the cake. I loved how the lego pieces and little lego men looked on the cake. It was super cute and the customer loved it.

 

The cupcakes got a small swirl of buttercream and were topped with a lego brick. I was super happy with these. The cake and the cupcakes were just too cute. I can’t wait to do more lego themed baking!! Enjoy!

 

 

Meg