Cinderella - and cake pops!

A few weeks ago, I got my first referral customer! My friend Ann, who taught me everything I know about cake decorating, is currently on maternity leave, had referred a client to me! Her name is Daniella and she wanted a Cinderella cake like the one that I made for Cecilia, along with cake pops decorated to look like pumpkins, all for her daughter Lauren's birthday. I decided to decorate the Cinderella cake with fondant, since I remembered how difficult it was to use buttercream. Little did I know that the day I decorated the cake, the temperature outside was in the mid-70's, and because of my oven being on, the temp in the house wasn't that much cooler. Yikes! I ended up having to do a bit of patch work and was a little disappointed that the cake wasn't as perfect as I wanted it to be. But it still looked pretty good!

Next up was the cake balls. I decided that cake pops would be really cute, and I bought a styrofoam ball that I decorated to look like Cinderella's carriage. This was my first time making them, so I did a ton of research. I went to the Bakerella website, my friend Ann's blog, and asked a few other friends as well. I mean, I know the basic idea is pretty easy - make a cake, break it into crumbs, add frosting, roll into balls, dip in chocolate, and viola! But still... I wanted to make sure I didn't mess them up. After I felt confident enough, I got started - and everything was going smoothly until I started dipping the pops in the chocolate. They started falling off the sticks! Maybe it was because I had scored the sides of the balls to make them look like pumpkins, but anyhow, I ended up having to spoon the melted chocolate over them and they didn't look exactly like I wanted them to, but close enough.

 I then decorated each with fondant stems and leaves before the chocolate set. Then I wrapped them, tied them off with ribbon and stuck them in the styrofoam pumpkin, just to see how it would look - very cute if I do say to myself!

And here is Cinderella with her "coach"

I took the cake pops out of the pumpkin (couldn't deliver them that way without worrying about the whole thing falling over!) and put them in a nice little box.

Hope you had a wonderful birthday, Lauren, and that you loved your Cinderella cake and pumpkin cake pops as much as I loved making them!

Minnie Mouse!

Two months ago, I got a message from my friend Marge, who had been following all of my adventures in cake decorating and wanted me to make a cake for her granddaughter's birthday. I was happy to provide a cake for her, and when she told me a month later that she wanted a Dora the Explorer cake, I got to work looking up ideas. I had everything all set and was about to go to the store to get some little toys to put on top of the cake, when I got a message from Marge stating that there was a change in plans. She had been to a party supply store to get invitations and her granddaughter saw a pair of Minnie Mouse ears, grabbed them and put them on her head. Marge later told me that her granddaughter never lets anyone put anything on her head. No headbands. No hats. So when she grabbed the mouse ears and proudly displayed them, Marge knew that a Minnie Mouse party was the way to go. She purchased a candle and some toppers and sent me a message stating the change in plans. So I started planning another design for the cake, all this time not knowing what the decorations that she had purchased looked like. I had an idea about what I wanted to do, but didn't know what colors I'd need. She dropped off the decorations on Thursday afternoon, and from there I set to work with the final design. It took a while, but in the end I came up with a design that I knew she would love.

Two days, two cakes and one yummy batch of strawberry buttercream, and lots of pink and purple icing (not to mention some fun fondant colors!) later, I was done.

Happy Birthday Autumn - I hope you love eating your cake as much as I loved making it for you!