Dragon Slayer

I really wanted to make something special for my fiance, Brandon, on his birthday. He also loves WOW, although not as much as Bryan does. But I'd already done a WOW cake for Bryan, so I wanted to do something different. He's really into other fantasy/sci-fi stuff, like dragons and swords, so I decided to do a dragon cake.

This was only my second attempt at using fondant, so I was a little nervous! The first attempt wasn't so bad... It was back in May, for Mother's Day... I just experimented on a little 9" round cake. It was plain white, with a bow on top. For my first time, I'd say it was pretty decent. Certainly nothing to brag about. So I decided there was too much detail I wanted to do for a dragon to simply use regular icing. It can be tricky to work with and mold just the way you want it, and if it's too warm, it just starts to sag and run. That's certainly not what I wanted. I'm a huge fan of how wonderful fondant looks, but I certainly don't enjoy eating it. It's like... sweet play doh. I tend to keep extra icing on hand so cake-eaters can reapply some icing after they've peeled their slice of cake.

As for his dragon cake, I sketched out a diagram of how I wanted to cut and shape the dragon.

Basic dragon shape:



After I had the shape, I just covered it with frosting, then fondant, cut off excess, and decorated! I gave the dragon some treasure to protect: gold-wrapped chocolate coins, and a treasure chest.


View from the top of the dragon, with his coins:




Brandon checkin' out his dragon, complete with flaring nostrils!


Brandon about to extinguish the dragon:

Cake Envy

I made a silly cake for a friend's birthday this past Halloween... :-) You could call it a gag gift, but that might be a horrible play on words..

I'm not really sure what else to say about it, as I'm sure the pictures (and blog title) will explain themselves.


Rainbow cupcakes:


The cake:

Les Tetons

My mom loves the Teton mountains. She grew up around that area-- her grandfather owned a cabin around there and she's reminisced many-a-time about Sunday morning breakfasts.

I try to cater each cake I do to the person I make it for. What fun is it if you don't make it personal? So for mom, back in September, I decided to express her love for those mountains in edible form. After all, love=food, right? ;-)

I made it with chocolate cake and cream cheese icing.. The mountains were made from cupcakes covered in mounds of extra icing. And then it was airbrushed, of course. This was actually the first cake I did after Brandon had gotten me my airbrush machine... It was terribly exciting for me to be able to use my very own at home, and not just at work!

Here are the Tetons:



Also, a shot of Mom blowing out her candles:

WOW!

And by WOW, I don't mean a cry of surprise... I mean the virtual expanse that is the World Of Warcraft. With over 11.5 million monthly subscribers, you know there's something to it. So my little brother Bryan is a huge fan. And when I say a huge fan, I mean that in every sense of the word. He plays. A lot.

Oh, he's also a big fan of strawberries. :-D

What might you have when you put the two together? Why, maybe a WOW cake and some strawberry cupcakes!

So, back in April, I joined two of his loves together... Now, the cake didn't turn out exactly like I'd hoped it would... I should've spent more time on the keyboard. I spent a lot of time on the drawing/computer screen...

Anyway, it was a nice reaction when he walked into the kitchen and he thought the cake was an actual laptop. That made it worth it. But hey, he probably had WOW on the brain... ;-)


Here's the "laptop screen" depicting the WOW login page:



And here's a scrumptious strawberry cupcake:



Finally, a group shot:

Faery-Topia

Last March, I did my second special at-home cake.. My brother's girlfriend, Amanda, turned 25. Amanda loooves faeries, so I wanted to give her something faery-ish and slightly gothic.

I love the cakes with the wires coming out the layers, so I wanted to try that on my own. Since I was using wires and beads, I decided to make Happy Birthday Amanda from beads as well. Also made cupcakes to go along with it.

Another Day, Another Dollar

The cakes I'm most proud of are the ones I think up and create at home... However, there are some work-related cakes I have really enjoyed making. So, from time to time, I want to include a compilation of the cakes I've done at work.

This is one of those posts.


Magician's cake:
The lady that ordered this cake gave me specific instruction to "make the rabbit as cheesy as the magician who's attending the party." :-)


MU Tigers cookie cake:


Unicorn cake:
Used a design off of an invitation (or a birthday card, I can't remember which) for this little girl's cake.



Bridal Shower cake:
This design came from an invitation a woman brought to me. This is one of my favorites from work... I added edible glitter to the dress to make it sparkly. :-) ...I love shiny things.



Bud Light, 21st Birthday cake:
This one was really fun to do... I did it looking off of an actual Bud Light bottle. You'll never know how tempted I was to have one of those while I worked!!



Surfing themed pullapart cupcake cake:
The mother that ordered this cake brought in a picture for me to draw from. I changed up the colors and the background some..



Disney Princess Belle, petit cake:
This wasn't for a special order, just for our cake case... Also made are Tinkerbell, Aurora, Cinderella, Barbie, and Belle.



Hello Kitty cake:
I was given a birthday card for reference on this cake... Had a lot of fun doing this one. Both the mom and the girl were sooo excited when they saw this!



Happy Birdday:
Cutest birthday message ever! Guest left it up to me on the design of the duck.. I thought this little guy was cute. :-)



Seinfeld Caricature cookie cake:
I made this one for the brother of a guy I work with. He loves Seinfeld.. Obviously!



Fall-themed birthday cake:
This one probably wouldn't have made it into the group of work cakes I love, but autumn is my favorite season. I love the colors in this.. And I like how the roses turned out.

Paul & Jesi's Hallowedding Cake

This was the first down-and-dirty, let's-get-serious cake I'd ever done... I was a department manager of the Bakery at Wal-Mart for a while, so I had a fair amount of practice at decorating cakes... But never had I done a wedding cake. Paul and Jesi asked me if I would be willing to do theirs, and I was excited and incredibly nervous at the opportunity. I made several practice cakes, and was actually quite pleased with the end result. Here're some pictures of the process:


This cake is the very first one I'd done at HOME. :-) It was my first practice cake for the wedding...

































Second practice cake...
































Final practice cake before the real deal!!

























And here it is!! Paul and Jesi's Hallowedding cake... Made of red velvet cake, chocolate buttercream icing (dyed black)... Red roses, white baby's breath, and a gorgeous topper that says, "Love Never Dies."
































Another shot of their cake...

































And a shot of the happy couple cutting into their cake :-)

Starting at the Beginning

I decided a while ago that I wanted to start a blog completely dedicated to the cakes and other yummies I make. It's become a real passion of mine, and I want to record my works. :-)

That said, I've made quite a few things up to now.. So I have some back-posting to do!

And awaaaaay we go!