Happy Birthday Zoo Animals

This number two was to be placed standing up in the middle of the cake before the party...I wish I could have got a picture of it complete...but because fondant does not always like butter-cream and refrigeration I did not want it to get "gooey" overnight.

Okay so this was a great cake to make...time consuming...but great. All the animals are made out of fondant. You can't imagine how long it can take you to make the perfect sized ear, or eye ball...its ridiculous really. Although it could have something to do with the fact that it was 1:00 AM? I loved the combination of the hot pink and the Zebra stripes. I really do think it was much cuter in person than my poor pictures could ever capture. The cake itself was "funfetti white" with a butter-cream filling...she is only turning two, you can not expect anything to exotic.

As far as the animals...I think the Hippo turned out to be my favorite...or maybe the turtle...or the Giraffe? I hope the sweet 2 year old liked it! I know that daughter #2 has decided that this will be her birthday cake next year...minus the animals because, " come on mom, I'm turning 9!"

Cake Truffles

Some people call these "cake balls". To me that just sounds so UN-Appetizing, so I have named mine "Cake Truffles". If you have endless supplies of cake and butter-cream icing on hand at all times, and many occasions to bring treats...these are just the thing for you. For these I used a combination of vanilla butter cake and chocolate fudge, for the icing I used my butter-cream and then dipped them in a better chocolate, Milk Chocolate Giuttard melting chips that I purchased at the cake supply store. The recipe (if you can call it that,) is very simple...

Cake any flavor, baked and then crumbled

frosting a flavor to compliment your cake...cream cheese works with everything

chocolate to dip in.

Simply combine cake and frosting, adding only enough frosting to form a moist but not "gooey" consistency. Roll tablespoon size into a ball and place in freezer for about 10 min. Take frozen cake balls out of freezer and dip in your favorite chocolate and let set. The master of these creations can be found at http://www.bakerella.com/ she does some amazing designs, and even appeared on the Martha show with them.

Cookies, Cookies, Everywhere!

The next batch of sugar cookies. This time I did some Zoo Animals for a little girls 2nd birthday. I was really happy doing the elephants, (and wish I had a better picture...but took it at midnight) I also did a hippo...not pictured, the girls said it looked like a hippo...however it was blue and white polka dot. The red shoe cookies are for a church function, I attached a saying about "there's no place like home....." I am giving them out as a favor for the night.

Shoe's!

I have been working with a shoe theme in mind as I thought of a church theme we are doing, "The Worth of a "Sole" is Great in the Sight of God"...so for refreshment and such I of course had to play around. I made the high heel shoe's out of fondant...as husband watched the election all night, I crafted high heels...not a bad trade-off.They are really very easy and I think they would be so cute on a shoe box cake. This cake however...not so cute. In the essence of time the cake was a Costco cake frosted white....I then proceeded to "dress it up" a bit to fit our theme for the night. I would have loved to make a shoe box cake, but with child # 3's surgery, pregnancy, cake balls, zoo animal cookies, and Wizard of Oz shoe cookies, peanut butter cookies (okay these were not mandatory) and homework all in the same night...I opted for Costco reved-up.

Reptile Birthdays!

The back view of the desert cake

The poor turtle looks scared to death...there is a snake hanging from the cactus behind him, and a Lizard about to eat his eggs... maybe that's why?

The front of the Desert Cake. You can hardly see my other turtle...bottom right corner, he was much happier and cuter!

The back of the Jungle cake.

Close-up view of the alligator and a frog on a lily pad.

You can hardly see the fish in the water...these are daughter #1's favorite part.

These are the cakes that I did for twin boys turning 5 years old. They were having a "Reptile" birthday party. The cakes were so much fun to make...I actually was surprised when I ended up liking the desert cake better than the jungle....I wasn't sure how a desert cake would turn out...but had a great time creating it. The desert cake was butter yellow cake with butter-cream filling, it was covered in butter-cream and then in graham cracker crumbs and sanding sugar ( to look like sand). All decorations were edible...some royal icing and the rest fondant.

The Jungle cake was chocolate fudge with cookies and cream filling, it was also covered in butter-cream with all edible decorations. Now I am working on more sugar cookies, this time "Red Ruby Heels"..think, "click, click, there is no place like home!"