Baboushka/Matryushka Doll cake

This week I was asked to make a Baboushka cake for a 4th birthday party and boy did I have fun making it! I baked a large rectangular white mudcake which I shaped into a doll and iced with vanilla buttercream and fondant. A garret frill cutter was used for the "broderie anglaise" frill on the apron and the name was painted on with edible paste colour, background stippled white polka dots. The rest of the cake was handpainted in floral and polkadot design.

I had a pretty nerve wracking moment when the edible transfer paper didn't want to co-operate while trying to trace the name onto the apron (paste was still too soft) so instead I had to scribe the name on before hand painting in the letters. My hands were shaking so badly I had to take a tea break before resuming the painting lol

Happy birthday Miss Parker

This week was Miss Parker's birthday (Annike's prep teacher) and the theme was birdies (red and aqua). The cupcake wrappers is from The cupcake wrapper co, ofcourse in birdie pattern ;-)
The cupcakes were made from butter vanilla sponge and iced in vanilla buttercream with fondant cake toppers. I used a birdie template to make the toppers and a letter press template to cut out the name. Each topper was then handpainted with food colouring paste.

Close up of one of the birdies, my inspiration came from Nievie-Pie cakes in the UK

Wedding canvas

I am so happy with how this canvas turned out, its a gift for a friend who was attending a wedding and wanted something a bit different. My brief was simply, I want a canvas with their name and wedding date on it, I had complete artistic license (yay) to paint what I wanted. I played around and thought of doing a silhoutte with the couples details painted at the bottom of the canvas, I quite like how simple and classy it looks (but don't be fooled as it was a lot of work ;-)) without looking overdone or kitch.

Pretend cake shop gift set - Project 3

This took quite some time to stitch, I spent every night for a week infront of the TV sewing these yummy felt goodies as part of a pretend cake shop play set for a friend's daughter who had her birthday party yesterday. I am really pleased how it turned out, once again I used felt scraps I had lying around to create the yummy goodies and the birthday card. I bought the pink suitcase from the internet (as I wanted a plain non character one) and handpainted the three figures to represent the birthday girl and her two best friends baking cupcakes together. The big "card" on the right of the photo is a menu I made for the pretend cake shop, I handpainted the cupcake with acrylics and printed the menu on the back and laminated the menu for protection. Very happy with the result :-)

Birthday cupcake set - Project 2

Another project for this week was this lovely half a dozen cupcake set made for a little girl who turned 5 last Thursday. I was experimenting with different types of fondant and paste, trying to work out which was best for flowers, and which was best for figures. This batch was vanilla butter sponge with strawberry and vanilla buttercream topping. All the decorations were handmade and dusted with some fairy dust (edible glitter) It looked awsome and tasted even yummier (I made extra for my girls lol)

Close up of the pixie, I used gerbra cutters to make her dress. I need to experiment a bit more with the faces as I am getting tired of the same expressions lol

Baby cot mobile gift set - Project 1

This week, one of three projects I had going was this lovely gift set for a friends baby girl (Audrey) born on the 18th March, 5.5 pounds. The birdie mobile was part of the gift set, I love how it turned out in the end. I had a clear idea of what it was supposed to look like, and thrilled I managed to do it. The birdie pattern I used came from SKIP TO MY LOU, its so cute. I used some felt and fabric scraps I had lying around in shades of pink, blue, red and cream to create the birds. An embroidery hoop was used as the frame of the mobile and scrap ribbon tied around the frame hid the timber and added some colour and visual interest. Although I stuck to the colour scheme each ribbon has a different width, pattern and colour. The idea for the mobile came from THE RED THREAD blog

I whipped up a taggy blanket with some left over Sandi Henderson fabric and pink minky, stitched a birdie card with some fabric and watercolour paper and made the gift tag with ribbon to hang from the wrapped parcel. I was a bit cash poor but time rich so decided to use some of my fabric and paper stash to make these gifts.

Happy Valentines Day

This is what we made today, Sugar cookies with Royal icing.

Ingredients
4 cups of flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
220 grams margarine or butter
2 cups white sugar
2 egg
2 tsp vanilla extract

Combine flour, baking powder and salt.
Beat the margarine and sugar and beat until fluffy.
Add eggs and vanilla; beat well.
Add flour mixture a few tablespoons at a time ; beat until well mixed.
Chill in the refrigerator for 1 hour or until easy to handle.
Roll out the dough and cut with favorite cookie cutters.
Place on cookie sheet and bake at 160 degrees for 15 min.