An order for Halloween Cupcakes

I think sharing my cupcakes with work mates has finally paid off! :) One of my work mates asked me if i could make some halloween cupcakes for the weekend, she has a 19 month old son and they are having a little halloween party at home. I can just picture a bunch of little kids dressed up as monsters munching on cupcakes, so cute!

She left the design of the cupcakes up to me which was nice but requested a vanilla cupcake base as it is what most kids will eat. I decided to go with ghosts and pumpkins after finding a couple of tutorials on the internet. People are so kind and generous to share their ideas, i love the cake decorating world :) I made the pumpkins and ghosts on Wednesday night and let them dry over night, and used the following tutorials:

Pumpkins http://thefrostedcakencookie.blogspot.com/2009/10/tuesday-toppers-pumpkin-jack-o-lantern.html

Ghosts http://www.abakedcreation.com/2009/10/ghosts-of-cupcakes-past.html

Husband had a wonderful idea of using fishing wire for the pumpkins and it worked alot better than using a knife, what a man :) So i will let him take credit for the pumpkins. And i just love the idea of using lollies under the ghosts, the kids will love the surprise I'm sure!

It was quite warm tonight and the swirl wasn't working as well as it should so im not 100% happy with them. It wasnt holding properly, especially compared to the swirl on the pink ribbon cupcakes i made recently. I just hope they dont all droop over night or i will be taking the morning off from work to re-do them!!!

I wanted to use black for the icing, as when i think of halloween i think black! but as these were for little kids i didnt want to make them too scary :)

Happy trick or treating everyone!!

Pink Ribbon fundraiser

One of the offices in our building is holding a Pink Ribbon Breakfast on Wednesday 21st October, but as i will be away from the office that day, i wanted to do my bit to contribute so i decided i would make some cupcakes and cookies, sell them to my team mates tomorrow and donate the money to the National Breast Cancer Foundation.

The cupcakes are my fave, yummy vanilla, topped with a pink (ofcourse!) buttercream swirl and then a disc of white fondant with a pink ribbon. I actually bought a ribbon 'mould' but the fondant just kept sticking to it, so i made the ribbons myself by cutting a thin strip of fondant and folding over. I haven't used buttercream on cupcakes in quite a while and i must say i missed using my 1M tip! I love the swirl!!

I had lots of fun making the cupcakes and cookies and can't wait to sell them off tomorrow!

Butterfly Effect

I was having troubles coming up with an interesting title for these cookies, and then with very good timing, i remembered the movie 'butterfly effect'!

I have a 'butterfly cookie' folder saved on my computer with a bunch of gorgeous designs which i have collected from the net so i decided it was time to christen the butterfly cutter i bought about 2 months ago!!

The net is just fantastic, it provides so much inspiration for people like me who arent very creative! My favourite design is this one http://www.cakejournal.com/archives/how-to-decorate-cookies-with-rolled-fondant/ Just gorgeous and not hard to make at all! I will actually be doing these for someone in December :)

Since these were for the joy of my nieces, i had to do them in pink! I copied a couple of the butterflies (i hope this is allowed!) from a very talented person on flickr, but i still added my own personal touch to them.

I used the embossing mat which i purchased at the high tea cupcakes course, and i just love using it! It gives such a lovely finish, especially when dusted with shimmer dust...it really accentuates the swirls.

My nieces loved them, especially the 9yr old. Her bedroom wall is covered with butterflies! They were both very impressed with how i got the 'swirly design' on the fondant....i had them going for a little while but finally confessed that i used the embossing mat :)

High Tea Cupcakes

This morning i headed over to Cake Decorating Central in Castle Hill for the High Tea Cupcakes class. I had lots of fun and learnt so much at their basics cupcake class a few months ago so decided to give these a go too.

Aside from making the cute fancy hat, i didn't really learn any new techniques, i guess because i learnt quite a bit at the first course and i have also been doing lots of cupcakes lately, but it was still fun and we all left with very pretty and girly cupcakes.

Oh, i should mention that i could have learnt how to make a particular type of large rose (pictured in the bottom centre) but after failing many times i gave up and decided roses arent for me he he.

We have a family birthday tonight so i will take them to share, but the birthday boy is turning 50-something so i don't know what he'll think of these girly cupcakes :)

I brushed some shimmer dust on the cupcakes, and it gave them a gorgeous sparkle...i hope it shows up in the photos!

Mum's Birthday Cake

Tomorrow 7th October is my mum's birthday. My mum has always been the most sweetest, honest, caring and loving mum one could hope for and i love her to bits. I love her birthday because it means we get to spoil her a little more, but she is so amazing that she really deserves to be spoilt every day.

Seeing as though cake decorating has become my new hobby, i thought that this year part of my present to her would be a cake. I knew it would take me quite some time and it just feels more special giving her something which has required time and patience.

This was my first cake on my own!!!! I was relying on what i had learnt at Planet Cake's Basics 101 to get me through! I decided on the Giant Cupcake cake from the Planet Cake book. I was a little nervous to begin with and asked myself many times why i didn't pick a simple round cake!

It was almost impossible to get a perfectly smooth dome but i did the best i could and the fact that the dome had 2 layers of fondant (the brown and the white) meant that a few little bumps miraculously disappeared :) I had heaps of fun and really enjoyed the whole process from baking the cake, ganaching and covering with fondant.

I was really pleased with how the cake turned out. Im so excited and cant wait to bring it to the table tomorrow night when we'll be having a small family birthday dinner.

I feel much more confident having done a whole cake on my own and am ready to tackle some more designs. A round cake should now be a breeze right??? Let's hope so!

Happy Birthday mum, i love you xox