Stack of Books or Cake? Cake, silly.

This cake was for my dear sister's 24th birthday who LOVES books. So much that she would rather buy you a book then lend you one of her own and have it looking slightly worn (that's how I own Twilight). My sister didn't always love reading. It wasn't until she read "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" that she fell in love with books. She now owns many many books, several she's never read, and some she refuses to finish, so as to not end a series. So, it seemed very fitting to make her a stack of books cake of her 3 favorite titles.

(inside: rich dark chocolate cake with light whipped ganache and strawberry slices for the filling. It tasted like a chocolate covered strawberry. Milk highly suggested.)

I love you, Taryn. You're one of a kind :)

Happy Birthday Gracie!

It's been a while. I'm really bad at taking nice pictures of my cakes when I'm in a hurry and stressing. So, some of my recent cakes unfortunately were only documented with my trusty iPhone. I'm even worse at blogging about my cakes. I'm a busy woman.

This is Gracie and her doll Julie. Always nice to see the customer with the cake. She loved it!

She was having a Wizards of Waverly Place party. The cake matched the napkins and Wizards of Waverly Place birthday party plates and cups and such. Inside was vanilla cake with a strawberry cream cheese filling.

Justin Bieber!

Mickinzi and her brother Easton contacted me last week to make a birthday cake for their daughters who were having a combined birthday party. They had an idea of a Justin Bieber cake they had seen online and wanted something similar. Inside the bottom tier is Pink Velvet cake with cream cheese filling, and in the top is Vanilla Cloud cake with chocolate buttercream. It was so fun to make! I only wish I could have made it sing "oh baby, baby, baby oh!"

Ally's Wedding Cake

My cousin Ally (short for Alejandra) is my favorite cousin. We grew up together. Spent weeks together in the summer at her home in Monroe, Utah. We both praised the two laziest cartoons in cartoon history, Garfield the cat and Homer Simpson. We have so many memories.

She was married on Saturday and asked me to make her cake. I had another cake to do the same day for Tanya, that I had to deliver to Syracuse. Luckily, I was able to deliver that cake in the morning (talking 7am. 1 hour drive.) and head to Ally's wedding later that afternoon down in Richfield. It was a loooong two days. I'm still learning how to organize my time when I have these big projects, and sometimes things go wrong and end up taking a lot of time to fix. So, I didn't really go to sleep on Friday. I took a nap at 9am Saturday morning for an hour and a half. But I'm so happy with how the cakes turned out.

Unfortunately, with all the craziness that caused me to not have time to sleep, I also forgot to find time to take a picture of Tanya's cake. I got one pic with my iphone, but I'm hoping I'll get some better pics from her photographer.

On top of my cousins cake are black ribbon roses. These are easy to do, which is very convenient when the gumpaste flower you made falls apart the minute you are supposed to be leaving for the wedding :).

PS3 and Mission Farewell Cakes

My sister asked me to make a Playstation 3 cake for her husband's 28th surprise birthday party. She was going to tell him that she wanted to buy him the real thing, but couldn't afford it, so the cake was the next best thing. Little did he know, she had been saving up and he would indeed get the real thing. I've never made a cake like this one before, so I was a little scared. But despite it's imperfections, I think it turned out pretty well! They loved it! And I had a few people at the party confuse it for the real thing (at a quick glance :))

The next cake was for a young lady's mission farewell. She was called to the Philippines and her mother wanted a figurine of her daughter wearing a ponytail. Heads are tough to make. Fondant dries quickly, so too much handling and well, things get messy. After smashing two heads in frustration, I finally got it on the third. The cake is the Philippines flag and she sits on top. Her bags are packed, Book of Mormon in hand, she is ready to go!

Raspberry Limeade Cake

Yesterday was my mother-in-law's birthday and we had a barbecue to celebrate. I made a Raspberry Limeade cake for the occasion. It went perfectly with the other outdoor grub. If you like tart desserts (think Key Lime pie) you'll love the flavor of this cake. Limeade cake and frosting with raspberry lemonade filling. I love summer barbecues!

Mini Tiers for the Bake Sale

The bake sale has come and gone, but I thought I'd quickly post pictures of the cakes I made. They were featured on my facebook page, but just in case you missed 'em. They are both mini tiers, the bottom cake is 6 inches and the top is 4 inches. The strawberry cake is strawberry cake on the inside as well. Made from scratch with real strawberries, no artificial flavors. This is one of my favorite flavors! Especially for the summer!
This cake is rich, dark, devilish chocolate cake with vanilla frosting.

I hope whoever bought them thoroughly enjoyed each bite! They are so cute! I'm hoping someone has me make more of these mini-tiers. Maybe for centerpieces at a reception?