Archive for the ‘Children's Birthday Ideas’ Category

Figurine Sculpting Class

Thursday, February 25th, 2010

Well, one thing I do look back on this year and am sad about is the lack of classes I was able to teach because I was so busy and overwhelmed with opening up a new shop of my own.  Now as much as I wish I could say that I am offering a class really soon, I can’t, BUT don’t worry because I have an amazing class that I want to pass along to all of you cake lovers!  I just found out from Kyla, who heads up the Capital Confectioner’s in Austin, Texas that they will be hosting a class here in Southern California.  The amazingly talented Lorraine McKay will be teaching you how to sculpt realistic figurines!  This is one skill that is very hard to learn by yourself and I highly recommend taking this great opportunity to learn under Lorraine.  She is offering four different classes at Classic Cake in Garden Grove.  To get all the information about the classes definitely check out their website!  Here are just a couple photos of Lorraine’s beautiful work!  Definitely let me know if you will be going to the classes!

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Hope lots of you can make it!

New Special Occasion Cakes!

Thursday, February 25th, 2010

Although we do mostly wedding cakes at the shop we also love making special occasion cakes to help people celebrate that special day in their lives!  These types of cakes can sometimes require a lot more work and detail then wedding cakes, but I find that it’s all or nothing when it comes to them because when you say you will make someone a cake that replicates a real life item it either looks like it or not…not too much room for error.  With that being said, my big undertaking this month was a DJ Turntable Cake.  I was pretty happy with how it came out, but definitely underestimated the hours I would have to put into it!

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And since it was a 1st Birthday Cake we added a special element for the birthday boy!

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This next cake was for a 25th birthday party!  She loved peacock feathers and knew her color scheme, so we took that and ran with it!  My sister made the sugar flower and feathers and I think they are amazing!

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Kid’s cakes are a lot of fun too, but I try to make sure they still follow my style and don’t get too overdone…here is a Panda Bear Cake with tiny sugar flowers and butterflies!

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My assistant, Louisa, made the Panda Bear and I think it turned out great! I love the half smile and cute little face!

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Now sometimes people don’t have a lot of money to spend on a special occasion cake, but want something beautiful and delicious, so I always suggest the rustic style cream cheese frosting cakes with fresh flower accents because I think they are just as gorgeous in their own simplistic way!

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We also got to do a recent Sweet Sixteen Birthday Cake and she wanted a princess tiara crown and a bold sugar flower!

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Lastly one of my favorite cakes recently was for a small wedding we did last weekend.  My new intern, Kyong, is definitely an artist and when I showed her the design I wanted to have painted on the cake she did it better than I could’ve imagined.  I was also quite happy with this garden rose sugar flower I made.  I wasn’t sure how I would like the flower once it had the red tips on it, but I was pleasantly surprised…I think it made it pop and really showed the gorgeous petals off!

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Well thanks for stopping by to check out my blog!  I’m currently in Texas and about to run off to my first day of class with Mike McCarey! We will be learning cake structure for crazy cakes and will be remaking this fantastic Big Bird Cake that Mike made for a Food Network Competition…wish me luck!

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Creating Custom Cakes…

Monday, November 23rd, 2009

As a cake designer I definitely tend to enjoy making high-end, fashion forward wedding cakes more than party cakes, but recently I have started being more selective with the party cake orders I have been taking and only choosing ones that I really feel I can put my own spin on them.  I don’t want to copy any party cakes or pump out a million kids cakes a weekend (like a lot of bakeries do)…I went into this business to be a custom cake shop where my clients would have one-of-a-kind cakes that reflected their styles and types of events.  This past year I have tried to start using a lot more new techniques at the shop and really utilize everyone’s talents on my team.  I tend to want to do everything myself since I ran my business like that for almost 2 years, but these past few months I have been inspired and honored to work with people on my team.  I try to push them harder and help them refine their talents and skills and I find they are doing the same for me.  So before I show these fabulous photos I have to give  a shout out to Susie, Louisa, Heather, Sara, Tim, Rosie, and Geoff!!!  I have been so blessed with such a wonderful team and of course I could never do it without my sweet Mommy & Daddy…you’re the best parents a girl could ask for!

This first cake was actually for a a old school friend of mine.  She contacted me a couple weeks ago as she was planning her mother’s 50th surprise birthday party and wanted a fashion forward cake.  This cake was definitely a little challenging, but in the end I was quite happy with it.

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The high heel was mainly made out of white chocolate and then covered in fondant.  I printed the Prada label on edible frosting sheets and used fondant to make the edible pearls and brooch.  The shoe box was covered in black fondant and then we put a white damask pattern on it to spice it up a little.

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This next cake was for a little girl’s birthday party.  Of course all little girls dream of princesses and castles so we made a three tier castle cake and added the Disney princesses to the cake.  

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Anther kid’s cake that we recently made was for a little girl’s first birthday party and her Grandma wanted a Betty Boop theme…this is what I came up with!

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This American flag cake was for a party honoring a past army admiral and I thought Heather did a great job on the painting!

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And last, but not least is a three tier topsy turvy cake we recently made.  This cake was fun because each tier of the cake celebrated one daughter in the family.  The top tier was for the little baby, the middle tier was for the little girl who loved Strawberry Shortcake, and the bottom tier was for the pre-teen who loved fashion.  I had a lot of fun making this cake and thought Susie & Sara did a great job helping me with it!

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Well, I hope you enjoyed stopping by and definitely let us know what cake you liked the best!

Halloween Photos: Part II

Sunday, November 1st, 2009

I hope all of you had a Happy Halloween!  I had way too many cute photos of my family that I thought I had to share them with you!  Plus I got the chance to make a fun 3D Pumpkin cake for a client of mine.  Her daughter was turning 4 years old and she wanted a fun cake that pulled in both occasions!  

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The cake was quite yummy inside!  The bottom tier was chocolate cake with whipped cream, strawberries & chocolate ganache. The middle tier was pumpkin cake with cinnamon cream cheese frosting & salted caramel. And lastly the top tier was banana cake with chocolate ganache and peanut butter cream cheese frosting.  

I hand sculpted each pumpkin and then airbrushed them to make them look more realistic.  Next I stacked them and created lots of vines and stems to fill in the gaps.  Here are some more close-ups of the cake…unfortunately I didn’t realize they weren’t in perfect focus under I was done with the cake, but at least they show you more details.

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These next photos are of my adorable family!  

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Aren’t they too cute for words!  Well, those aren’t the only Halloween photos I have for you…I just had to include these next few photos.  All I have to say is “How awesome is my staff!!!”  Now sadly, I had a wedding delivery that day and couldn’t dress up or else I would’ve strapped the pirate belt on and jumped in the photo!

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I think we can all agree that Octo-mom gets the best costume award!  Can you believe how great Louisa looks!

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And even my intern dressed up…as a chef of course!

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Goodies Galore!

Wednesday, October 21st, 2009

Well get ready for another random post full of lots of photos!  After a couple weeks at the shop I always have plenty of random orders that I photography (with my new camera of course!), so I thought today would be a good day to show them off! Hope you enjoy!

First up an adorable communion cake I did for a little girl.  I love how the clouds turned out! We used an edible frosting sheet to print the angels and verse and then piped a pearl border around it.  

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Since the clouds were just too much fun I thought I would show a quick tutorial on how we made them.  First roll random size balls of fondant and stick them together with a little dab of water or egg whites.  Then roll a thin sheet of fondant and cover the balls.  Next sculpt around the balls to form one large cloud.  And finally I airbrushed the whole cake with pearl luster dust to give it a shimmer.

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Next we did a gorgeous homespun style cake and cupcakes for the sweetest bride! They LOVED our red velvet, so they got a small two tier cake and lots of yummy cupcakes for their guests.  I love when my clients are so much fun to work with!  I also had to snap some photos of the beautiful flowers they had…I love the rustic, wildflower look!

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Another fun cake I got to make recently was a Lego style cake for a cute little boy who turned 4 years old!  They wanted a little Lego firefighter on the cake as well, so I sculpted one for them.  I thought it would be fun to incorporate the Lego style with the wording too, so Tim designed the graphics for his name and age…I thought they turned out great!

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We love doing custom orders too, so these next photos are some special orders we did for our clients.  First up are some custom decorated cake lollipops for a recent baby shower.

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Next we did some logo style brownies for a recent birthday party.

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I love when our clients come to us with fun ideas!  Our client wanted to surprise her boyfriend for his birthday with custom cupcakes that had his face on it…how great are these!

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Another fun surprise was when I was asked by Tiffany’s in South Coast Plaza to make a cake for one of their client’s anniversary.  They wanted lots of sugar peonies and pearls!

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Well thanks so much for stopping by my blog!  Hope you enjoyed the photos!

Lincoln’s Baby Shower

Thursday, October 1st, 2009

Well, when my sweet friends Gabriel & Carlie, who are also the fabulous photography team behind Gabriel Ryan Photography, asked me if I could help out with some sweet treats for their baby shower I jumped at the chance!  Not only are they the sweetest couple ever, but some of the most talented and amazingly creative too!  They also recruited Jesi Haack, from Jesi Haack Weddings, and Carissa, from JL Designs, to help out with the design and florals too…how could I ever turn down that dream team opportunity!  Those two ladies surprise me every time with their fresh, new ideas…  

Little Lincoln’s day was one for the books, the style, creativeness, and love behind this event is clearly evident in the photos to come!  Everyone added their special touch to the day and it turned out perfect!  I am so excited for Carlie and Gabriel and blessed to have them, and soon baby Lincoln, in my life!  Another fun perk of the day was that I got to use my NEW CAMERA!  I have basically been wanting a professional camera for 4 years now and recently was able to get one for my birthday…I have been ADDICTED ever since!  I even bought a new purse so my new little baby would be able to go everywhere with me.  Gabriel was kind enough to go with me camera shopping and boy was I happy!  I got a Canon 50D, a 50mm lens, and a 28-135mm lens. Of course Gabriel’s fabulous photos outshine mine by a million degrees, but I thought I would include some of my detail shots for the heck of it!  I hope you enjoy the eye candy!

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I can’t say enough about all the details that were not left undone.  I believe that the most important part of any event are the personal touches and this shower had more than I can count…oh by the way, how cute is the mother-to-be!!!

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Need an owl fan or fresh lemonade…check!

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How gorgeous are these handmade necklaces Carliee and her girlfriend made for the special women in her life!  She also graciously gave us the most fabulous little button rings which I so wish I had a photo of…think Anthropolgie!

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Of course I couldn’t do a post without some dessert photos as well…so here they are!

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Karrie, from Karrie Pyke Designs, made me the most adorable little owl images for my cookies…can’t thank her enough!

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And of course no party is complete without some red velvet cake and carrot cake lollipops and mini candy bar cupcakes!

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And lastly some inside shots of the party…how cute are these gifts!

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Can’t wait to meet you Mr. Lincoln Roe!!!

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