Bang Bang!

I was fortunate enough to be in two different musicals with a local church, First United Methodist. 

The first year I was in My Fair Lady (top 5 favorite musicals of all time) and this last year I was in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. 

The cast was really an amazing group of people and I really wanted to do a little baking for them. 

But, with a cast of 60+ a regular cake during rehearsals would be a little tricky. 

So, I decided to tackle the cake balls again. 

Now, two years ago, I had successfully made 2 cake pops:

hello kitty - for my friend Jessica's birthday, and

a little chickie I was trying to take to an Easter/Family reunion thing. 

So, 2. Oh believe me...there were supposed to be more:

The problem was that my chocolate was a brand I'm not fond of (but had no other option) or that I had them too cold before I dipped them.... because all the rest cracked or oozed and weren't cute at all. :(

But, that was then, and these were just cake balls. 

A little dip in the vat of chocolate. A nicely contrasting drizzle on top. Easy and done :)

It also helped that they were in the mini cupcake liners. Made them look like truffles I think. 

Strawberry, cream cheese truffles covered in white and dark chocolate.

YUM!

Call of Duty

Oh man. 

That game. 

In fact my husband is playing it right now. 

It takes up too much time. 

From everyone. 

But when I was asked to make a graduation cake for our friend Mark, who has the same small addiction as my husband, I knew what to do. 

I spent a lot of time looking at the logo.

I hand cut each letter.

I bought a toothbrush so I could splatter paint. 

It took too much time ;)

But seriously, it was fun to create. I liked trying to make my spoof work in the little details. 

And, because the sides of the cake would be lonely (and it was a graduation cake, after all) I added some Double T's and some soccer balls around the side.

Mark's three loves: Call of Duty, Tech, and Soccer. Throw in some single gals and he'd be all set! ;)

Thanksgiving dinner!

mmmmmmmm..... there is nothing like a good turkey dinner on Thanksgiving. 

Ask my husband about my thoughts on other meats. It's not pretty!

So, I knew that for my first year of hosting Kindergarten Thanksgiving dinner (for parents too) I needed to do something fun. 

The year before, I had been given Hello, Cupcake! from a co-worker and knew there were some great options in there...but no turkey! :(

I did a little googling and found something that I had ingredients on hand to make (I mean really...they're 5 and 6 year olds...they wouldn't know the difference! ;) 

(It *was* actually an awesome way to get rid of the surplus Halloween candy that was reaching its second week of calling to me from the bowl!)

So, the first picture shows ideas from the book: 

corn (jellybellies, dark green sugar for the pepper and a pad of starburst 'butter)

peas 'n carrots (quartered orange starbursts and green sixlets)

mashed potatoes with gravy (frosting, pumpkin flavored ice cream syrup - I had to go seasonal!)

and a drumstick (white chocolate painted bones, a mini reese's cup, underneath piled frosting and ground - smushed - golden crisps)

Next is the turkey idea I found on the internet and my own creation. 

On the right is the turkey idea: a plate of Thanksgiving dinner (a cookie plate, frosting taters, nonpariel peas, ground golden crisps dressing, and the coup de grace is a split cashew turkey with gravy!)

Then on the left was my own creation. I had too much green frosting... and a plethora of sour apple air heads from halloween that would never get eaten in my house. NEVER. 

So, I made some green bean casserole. :-D

They were a hit with the kids and the parents and I had a blast creating them all!

Oh yeah! I just remembered that I made the cupcakes all different flavors too!

One was cranberry, one was pumpkin spice....and the third was....gingerbread maybe? Hmmm...that was a while ago ;)

Lakers win in '10!

So, my friend Jessica's family moved to Texas from California. 

And they're ridiculously huge Lakers fans! 

So, when their 10th wedding anniversary happened to be so close to the Lakers victory in 2010, she knew exactly the cake she wanted to surprise her husband with! 

We tossed a few ideas back and forth, and after a little googling, inspiration hit!

Once again, my procrastination tried to get the better of me. Let's just say in the future, I'll not be making cakes for parties I'm attending and wanting to spend a little time looking nice for. It's too much.

Anyway, I really enjoyed how this cake turned out, but I wish I had a better picture of it, instead of the one with my fondant and powdered sugar mess at the top of my workstation!

I will say that when I posted this on facebook, one friend said she actually thought it was a shirt at first look. :-D

It only took 8 years!!

So, my husband's journey to graduation was a long one. 

In and out of school, 4 different schools, 4 different cities. 

Hard work and a job well done!

So, we had a big party for him (and his sister, who was graduating at the same time).

I could have gone in many different directions with the cake (and came really close to doing the ZIT cube ) but he really likes our school's seal. So that's what we ultimately decided upon.

The black is all frosting marker, but each little design in the middle was hand made cut-outs. And they sucked!! They are the single reason that I will never again do a TTU seal cake! (unless someone were to pay me an exorbitant amount of money in excess of $500 ;)

I also managed to make the inside of the cake Tech-themed as well :)

New Flower Fondant Cutters

My husband can be a tool at times. 

Especially when I'm trying to create a new post. 

But, I digress....

My mom was a hostess for a bridal shower and was placed in charge of the cake.

She was given a budget and then hired me! Woohoo!

So, I was told to go find a spring/flower napkin and make it match.

Talk about limitless boundaries!

I found a cute orange one with some lime and turquoise flowers. 

That's when I knew it was time to purchase some fondant cutters. Michael's had a new daisy set that I had already seen. They were cute! 

The two layers of flowers were fun to work with, and made it easy to give a lot of color choices around the cake.

And, while I knew the cake was not nearly as dark as the napkins, this next picture in natural lighting makes them look completely different! Now I know :)

The Game ... of Life!

So, our friends Jessica and Jarrod were getting married and we had a shower for them. 

But, they asked for board games for the shower gifts, and we got to play some at the party. It was actually a pretty great idea - we love games in our house!

So, I knew that this would be the perfect time to make a Game of Life cake so I could put some spaces from the game that would fit their new lives together.

I actually looked at the real game to pull words and phrases - and as my cousin pointed out later, it would be nice if we could get childcare for just $5,000 these days!

I made the car and people from rice crispie treats again. And also the bushes. 

This was also my first creation after purchasing my 16x16 (and two smaller) pan(s) from Michael's with my 40% off coupon. That set is *definitely* worth the $25 I paid for it!!

Bakerella?

Somehow I managed to stumble upon the website www.bakerella.com

I am in heaven. She's just marvelous!! I saw some postings about cake balls. 

I didn't know what they were but I knew I wanted to try them. 

So, I decided that K's 3rd birthday would be based on the Very Hungry Caterpillar book and I could make cake balls for the body segments.

My awesome friend Liz made her invite for me....and totally rocked it!!

So it's the day of, I'm rushed (as usual) and I'm ready to get this stuff going.

Apparently I was so excited about the cuteness of cake balls, I didn't really read the instructions well. 

I almost made them without baking the cake first! I thought you just used the dry mix with the frosting. 

Good thing I thought it seemed really weird and double checked!

Well, I made the 'the right way' but since I really didn't know what I was doing...they flopped.

Partly because my town only has a certain brand of melting chocolates (they suck) and they didn't cover the balls well. Also because I didn't know it would take so long to dip each ball and I was in a hurry.

So there are the 6 segments on the caterpillar. And you see that leaf to the right? Yeah...the one that looks like a cake sandwich? Yeah...that's the leftover mix there. Live and learn, right?

But, the kiddo was happy about the party (and literally will still bring it up today, 1.5 years later!), and I did get all of the fruits and other foods from the story made (and in the correct number) so that was awesome. :)

Oh yeah! And looking at this pic reminded me that I also tried this cherry pie pop recipe from Bakerella and they were perfect! Probably my favorite, actually :)

Oh Baby!

My mom's cousin was having her first baby. They waited a really long time to have a kiddo, so we were all super excited for them!

When I was asked to make the shower cake, I was thrilled.

A little less thrilled that the shower was 7 hours away from me, but thrilled!

It did let me find out how to logistically transport a cake though :)

Anyway, I was sent an invitation and a picture of the napkins and got my idea!

I'm proud to say that the cake made it in one piece!

I don't have a picture of the top, but it had the words from the napkin. 

The shower was fun, and we got to see my Granny as well (who also lives 7 hours away).

How old am I?

My mom called to say that she was hosting a graduation party for Loriann.

The same Loriann that I used to babysit. 

One of the youngest ones I babysat, in fact. 

*sigh*

So anyway, the call was to ask if I would make a cake for her. Well, of course I would!

I needed a little inspiration though, so I asked mom to find out her favorite colors.

Red, Purple and Light Blue. 

hmmm.....

Didn't seem to work in my head. At all.

But then I started a little drawing and started to like it more and more. 

(I also remember trying out some new flavors with this one...but I have no idea what kinds. )

Here's what we ended up with:

Red, Purple and Light Blue - who knew? :)