Cinderella Dress Cupcake Cake Repin Love

I use Pinterest as my picture gallery on this blog.  Pinterest is easy, free and has it has many, many users.  One of the neat things about it is that other users can "repin" one of my pictures to their Pinterest boards.  When I view my own boards, I can see stats like how many times a picture has been repinned.

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Up until recently, this picture of a sheet cake I did with lattice work and buttercream roses pretty much held the record for the most repins of all my cakes.

I was very happy with this cake when I made it years ago but it's funny that a simple sheet cake was the most repinned out of all my cakes.

You may notice that I said until recently this sheet cake was the most repinned.

 Just in the past few weeks, another one of my cakes has been getting repinned like crazy.  This Cinderella dress cupcake cake has been repinned so much lately that it has now surpassed the rose sheet cake to take the #1 slot.

Every time one of my pictures is repinned, I get an email from Pinterest.  Over the past few weeks, I have been getting several emails per day letting me know that this cake has been repinned.

I am happy that I made something that other people look to for inspiration.  I enjoyed making this Cinderella dress cupcake cake for Emma's birthday party as well as a cake for her handmade crown.

More Cakes For Men

A while back, I wrote about cake design ideas for guys.  So many store bakery cakes look a little girly, with roses and swirls and well...girly stuff.  I love frilly cakes, but sometimes guys want something for their birthday that represents their interests.

Here are a few more design ideas for guys of all ages.

Stack of Books Cake

Stack of Books Cake

When my aunt decided to throw a party for my uncle, her and my cousin for their milestone birthdays, she asked if I would make the cake.  Of course, I said yes then I brainstormed about a design that would incorporate birthdays for three different

people.  The design I came up with was a stack of books with a title on each that reflected something about the person.

My uncle will be 80 this year and is known for having a story on just about everything.  My aunt is a blonde and hit 70 this year.  My cousin, who turned 50 in June, loves all animals and has a special fondness for cats.

I decided to poke a little fun at the birthday celebrants:

I sacrificed a bit of cleaness in the design because I really wanted these cakes to be iced in buttercream instead of fondant.  Before I started, I did some research into how to get a more realistic looking book cake while using buttercream.  

Before this cake, the only book cake I had made was an open book cake.

I am especially happy with how my cake board turned out.  I covered it in fondant, made distress marks, scored it with a ruler and then airbrushed it to look like a wood floor. 

We had a great time at the party and I got to see old friends and family that I had not seen in a while.

Sheet Cakes

Sheet Cakes

Ahh, the lowly sheet cake.  I was very surprised to find out some time ago that many custom cake decorators refuse to make sheet cakes.  They see the sheet cake as beneath them.  Why has this form of cake gotten such a bad rep?  My theory is that the sheet cake reminds them of W*mart or grocery store cakes - they equate sheet cakes with low price and/or inferior quality or skill.  If you think that sheet cakes are boring and ugly, I hope this post changes your mind.

Challenges

As a decorator, sheet cakes can be challenging.  The height of the cake is a regional preference.  Where I live, a sheet cake is 1-layer, about 2 inches tall. This limited cake height can make it difficult to do anything with the sides are than just smooth ice them.  Here are a few sheet cakes where I did do something different with the sides.

In this chocolate sheet cake with marshmallow flowers, the sides are decorated with a star tip (like #18) in a vertical pattern.

In this Independence Day themed cake, I piped a simple pattern of string work on the sides.

Many decorators have a hard time figuring out how to fill the top of the cake with a pleasing design.  One thing I see written on cake decorating forums is "How do I fill up all that space?"  

If my client wants me to come up with a design on my own, I start by asking myself these questions:

• what type of event is this cake for
• are there any techniques that I have been wanting to use
• are there any specific colors that I need to use

For example, I was asked to make a sheet cake for a baby shower.  We knew the baby was a girl, the colors were going to be pink and purple, and the party plates/decorations had baby feet on them.  Based on that information, here is the design I came up with:

When I offered to make the cake for my brother-in-laws birthday, the only specific request was that it be a strawberry cake.  I knew my brother-in-law likes Bud Light beer and I had been wanting to do one of those "gravity-defying" floating can cakes so here is what I came up with:

This cake also gave me a chance to try out my new cake airbrush.  

I was asked to make a sheet cake for a birthday cake for an 80th birthday party.  The two requirements was that the cake needed to be dark blue and include daisies (favorite color and flower of birthday girl).  I came up with a design that my client and the birthday girl both loved.

The sheet cake works particularly well for graduations

 

and children's birthdays.

The sheet cake is very versatile and is a great way to provide cake for a large but informal party.  I would definitely take issue with anyone that thinks the above cakes are boring or ugly.  

So...don't be hatin' on the sheet cake :)

Easy St. Patrick's Day Cake Ideas

Easy St. Patrick's Day Cake Ideas

Even if you don't celebrate St. Patrick's day with cake, you probably know someone who has a birthday in March.  Here are some cakes that would be perfect for St. Patrick's Day or for a birthday that falls around that time.

This design was accomplished by using the frozen buttercream transfer technique.  I love the facial expressions on the clovers.

This square cake is a bit more sophisticated version of a St. Patrick's Day themed birthday cake.  I used fondant for the stripes and the 4-leaf clover flower.

A rainbow theme is also great for a St. Patrick's Day theme.  To create this type of cake, read my post about How To Create a Rainbow Cake.

Here's a different kind of rainbow cake.  I created it using the Petal Technique using buttercream.

Here's hoping you find your pot of gold....

Easy Halloween Cake Ideas

Easy Halloween Cake Ideas

Halloween provides lots of inspiration for cake decoration.  I have had the opportunity to make several sheet cakes close to Halloween.  Here are some easy Halloween cake ideas:

Frozen Buttercream Transfer

This one is a not so scary one done for October birthdays at an office.

This one is a little bit more on the scary side.

Both of the cakes above were decorated using a technique commonly referred to as Frozen Buttercream Transfer (or FBCT).  You can search YouTube for videos of how to do it.  The main thing to remember is to put down that part of the design that will be in the front first.  FBCTs are done from front to back so when you flip it over, the design will be right side up.

I normally work on the FBCT design first and keep it in the freezer while I ice the cake.  I find designs in clip art or coloring books.

Fondant Cut-Out

This next cake was iced in buttercream but the decorations were cut out of fondant.

I started out with a design idea in my head and then found clip art that would work with the design.  I had lots of fun with this design.  The skull, helmet, chin strap, wings, and flames were all cut out separately.  I used an edible food marker to draw the facial features on the skeleton face.  The barbed wire was also made out of fondant.

I admire cake decorators who can truly capture a macabre or twisted design.  Black Cherry Cake Company in the UK is great at these.  Here is their website:

Black Cherry Cake Co.

Here's hoping you get lots of treats with no tricks this Halloween!