Let them eat cake(s)

So, apparently moving and becoming a temporary stay at home Mom means no spare time whatsoever. Between unpacking and trying to entertain a 9 month old...free time is at a minimum. Well, now that the little guy is taking a nap (please don't let that be a jinx), I have decided to FINALLY sit down and tell you about 2 cakes I made recently a while back for my nephew and niece's birthday parties. No, these are not actually pins on my pinterest, but they did come out very cute, and so I wanted to share them with you!

The first cake I made was for my nephew, Matthew. His birthday party was on Super Bowl Sunday, so naturally it was decided that his party would be football themed. After googling football cakes and looking through the plethora (big word!) of choices, I decided on this fun looking cake. There were no instructions with this picture, so I had to come up with how to put this cake together on my own, and if you ask me, I did a pretty good job.

Here is a picture of how my version on the cake came out:

My football is not nearly as good as the original, but as a (very) beginner cake decorator, I was quite pleased with this cake, as were the guests at the party. In fact, one of the guests asked their mom if she could make the cake for them for their upcoming party. Can you say trending??

Now how did this came come together you ask? It was actually very easy. The cake base itself is just two sheet cakes stacked together with a layer of frosting in between. The next step was making the end zones. This required edible sugar sheets as well as edible markers. After tracing the Lions logo onto the paper, running to the store for another pack of edible markers because it ran out half way, and filling in the letters, the end zones were complete! Yard lines were extremely easy...simply make straight lines across using white frosting. I cut the corner off of a small ziploc bag and used that to pipe on the lines.  The edging around the cake is supposed to look like grass, and that was done using the Wilton tip #233. This tip is also commonly used for making monster fur (i.e. Cookie Monster). I would have to say that the hardest part about this cake was the football. My husband and I had some good laughs over the various shapes I came up with, and eventually settled on the "football" on the cake above. I say settled, because it really could have and should have been a lot better. Hopefully next time! The football itself is made out of brownies that I mushed together and formed into shape. All in all a pretty simple cake that I was very happy to make for my nephew's party.

For any of you that know my niece, you know that she LOVES Hello Kitty. I for one will never understand why people love this creepy, big-headed anime cat, but to each their own! My niece, Lailie, had been planning her cake with me for a few weeks before her party. The last discussion we had about her cake left me with the following instructions: 1. It had to be blue 2. It had to be Hello Kitty. Easy enough. I didn't use the internet for this cake. I guess you could say I "designed" it all by myself! I really just made her a simple cake with Hello Kitty's face on it. She absolutely loved it, and the look on her face made me feel so special and I was more than happy to have done it for her!

Here is a picture of Lailie's cake:

This was also a very simple cake to put together. Once again this was 2 sheet cakes stacked together with frosting in between. Blue frosting covered the entire exterior of the cake, and then I added purple piping around the edges to add a bit of a feminine touch. The Hello Kitty face was the most challenging part of the cake. This would not have been possible without the help of my husband. THANK YOU!!!! I needed to print a picture of Hello Kitty, but the picture had to be a mirror image....NOT EASY! After about 45 minutes of interruped Bar Exam studying, my husband was finally able to print the picture for me. I then traced the picture onto parchment paper. I then piped frosting over the traced picture until the whole picture was filled in. When you do this method, make sure you do the most detailed parts first, and then work your way to the bigger sections. Meaning, do the outline and smaller details like the nose and eyes first, then work your way into filling bigger spaces, like the entire face last. I then put the paper into the freezer so that the face could harden and I would then be able to transfer it onto the cake. Keep in mind that at this point you will be looking at the back part of the face, which will be pressed onto the cake. After a while in the freezer, I flipped the image onto the cake and peeled away the parchment paper while holding my breath. It came out so cute!! Another cake that I am very proud of, but hope to improve my technique the next time I try this method. And just look at how happy she is!!

Pure joy!

Happy (very) belated Birthday Lailie and Matthew! I love you so much and can't wait to make you birthday cakes until it becomes embarrassing for you (and then I'll keep doing it anyway)!

Pincerely yours,

Rachel