I'm back!

The holidays are simply craft crazy for me.  I had a wonderful time this year, though it did mean that I slacked off on making cakes.  There are a couple there, but really I just focused on making special things for all the special people in my life.  Here is a brief photo catalog of what I've been up to.  Please excuse the quality of the photos - they say that the new iPod touches take the best pictures...bah!
I'll post the cakes in this entry, and the awesome craftiness that is my Christmas presents in another post.

Sesame Street Cake for Cartwheels and Coffee

Van Gogh Starry Night cake.  Painted fondant.

The spread at my kiddo's 4th birthday!

Super Mario Cake for my son's 4th.

The Little Mermaid cake, made with my super cool new fairie mold!

Chewbacca - my first 3d face

Other side of Chewbacca - Darth Vader, in buttercream.

173rd Airborne pin re-creation for my Father-In-Law
 and my first use of the airbrush.

Thomas the Train cake for Cartwheels and Coffee.

Baby Shower Present cake.

I had such a wonderful time doing all of these.  My new doll/girl/faerie mold has been most fun.  The Starry Night cake was an incredibly freeing experience.  I have always loved that painting, so to try to re-create it was fascinating.  I did get a new airbrush from my wonderful hubby.  My first attempts to use it are very... unpolished looking.  There is definitely a learning curve!  I did use it to to a pearlized look on the Baby Shower cake, and that was easy.  The Mario birthday party was SO much fun to put together, I think it deserves its own post.  I used the checkerboard cake pans my Mom sent me, so the insides are blue and red.  Too fun.  I was most disappointed in the Darth Vader cake.  I kept messing with it and eventually just made myself stop touching it.  I couldn't even find a Darth Vader cake done in BC online  though.  They are all made with fondant, and with good reason!  What a pain in the rear!  Chewbacca's expression made me chuckle.  The birthday boy asked his mama if it was real...he thought I had lopped off Chewie's head and served it up!  He did get over that though in time to let everyone know Chewie was just cake and stuck his fingers right in!
A whole lot of typing.  I hope I haven't bored you!  Next time I sit down to type another novel, it probably won't even have anything to do with cakes at all.  I've started to realize I have an inner Martha Stewart that is dying to come out.  Today alone I have made two crafts.  I may have to join C.A...Crafters Anonymous.  Till next time, toodles!

Sesame Street!

I have always loved Sesame Street.  Always.  Even now that they've changed the opening jingle and added such magical creatures as Abby and her flying faerie school, Rosita, and...yes, you guessed it, Elmo, among others.  Though I'm still in love with what was, I can absolutely appreciate what Sesame Street is still doing in helping little ones (like my 3 year old) and their parents have some quality time together talking about the letter Q and the number 17.

My client sent me an inspiration photo for this cake and I was beyond excited.  What a cute cake, what a great show, what a perfect 1st birthday party theme.
I used Americolor Super Red and Wilton Rose to get the red tint.  The yellow is a mix of Wilton's golden yellow and lemon yellow.  The cake itself is yellow cake, 2-10" layers and 2-6" layers with buttercream filling and frosting and fondant and gumpaste decor.  The smash cake is yellow cake with buttercream frosting.

Cookie Monster, Elmo, Oscar, and Big Bird are made out of fondant, and it was SO much fun making them.  The bow loops, spirals, and balloons are made out of gumpaste so they would dry nice and hard.  The little border balls are fondant rolled to (approximately) the same size and randomly stuck on.  The blue "ribbons" on the bottom tier are fondant rolled thin.  The street sign is fondant rolled thin and cut to shape.\ with buttercream lettering and border.
I would love to explain in more detail what I did with this cake because I did truly have the best time making it, but I am just now overcoming bronchitis (hence the long wait on posting this cake I made two weeks ago!) so this will just be brief.

Happy Birthday to you, Avery!