Janice's Bridal Shower

Megan's best friend Janice is getting married next month - and as one of the MOH's, Megan was in charge of bringing a butterfly themed cake. Janice chose orange and hot pink as her color scheme - so I used edible orange and pink wafer paper butterflies purchased from Fancy Flours (one of my not-so-secret baking supply obsessions) for a realistic take on her theme. They shipped and arrived incredibly quick - after cutting them out, I coated them with clear piping gel and dried them in egg cartons so they were more life-like. Just to add some sparkle, I brushed pearl dust onto the wings before attaching them to the cake. :)

The hot pink roses are real (thanks Safeway!) - I didn't have time to make them out of gumpaste. I used a circle of acetate on the top tier so the flowers wouldn't affect the taste of the icing and arranged the roses by sticking the stems into a ball of fondant to keep them in place.

The cake is a devil's food cake with a chocolate fudge filling and swiss-meringue buttercream icing...mmm... thank goodness for uneven tops...the boys and I enjoyed the scraps! :)

Here are a few views - I tried my best to make this cake viewable from every angle.

Sugar Cookies!!!

So, I tested and tested and tested sugar cookie recipes searching for the perfect recipe. I've had to tweak a bit, but found one that stays soft and yummy for days. Here are my latest creations...I've done wedding dresses, birthday cakes, etc...but never had the camera on hand for photos. :( Bummer. So, here begins the official documentation of my sugar cookie fetish! We took these to my friend Mai Mai's house for a summer BBQ earlier today - they got a great new outdoor kitchen that we were fortunate to be invited over to help christen! We had such a great time!

Butterflies for Teresa

These are some cupcakes I made for my friend Teresa's birthday. She loves yellow cake and chocolate frosting - so...I made the yellow cake and topped them with whipped chocolate ganache. I made the butterflies from royal icing - printed a template from Pretty Party Cakes (Peggy Porschen) that were just the wings - covered it with cellophane, put a thin layer of Crisco down to make sure the icing didn't stick, then piped the butterflies. I let them dry for two days. I used cardstock paper folded in a "M" shape layered with parchment paper to attach the wings to a thin line of royal icing and let dry for 3 hours or so. Once dry, I frosted the cupcakes then placed the butterflies on top - VIOLA!

I wish I had photos of the process - my almost two year old kiddo "ate" our memory card so we're waiting our new one to come in the mail! Yikes!!!