Cakes and more cakes

It's been a while, hasn't it?  Honestly,  I am losing the desire to blog because I seem to be just so uninteresting all the time.  I don't know what to talk about anymore apart from my baking and sewing. I am not much of a creative writer either so I don't blame you if you are finding that this is really getting quite boring. 

Like now...all I have to share are photos of more cakes.  Lately, I have been spending more and more time making them.  I don't really know how I got to this point and how I will be able to keep up.  As I've said many times before,  I have not attended any course in both baking and cake decorating. It's hard.  People seem to be expecting bigger and better things from me.  It's like I have to outdo my last cake every time.

I try my best though.  I think I am my worst critic.  I don't get satisfied easily.  And the only time I start feeling good is when I actually hear it from people that I did a good job and that the cake tasted delicious.

Bear with me then as I share with you my cake photos and a little story about each of them.  Or you can skip reading altogether.  It's perfectly ok.

Fireman Cake


Lemon chiffon cake filled and frosted with Swiss Meringue Buttercream.

I absolutely had no idea on how to do the decorations at first and had to look at images of fireman themed cakes over the net.

I started off with just the helmet and then as I was having a bit of fun, added the other components one by one...the hose, then the axe,  then the fire hydrant candle holder, then the water droplets.  I had to stop only because it was already getting way too crowded.  What touched the celebrant was that I even put the logo of his workplace on the helmet. Customizing cakes means putting such attention to details after all, isn't it?  By the way,  I used a leaf tip to pipe out the flames.  I had red, yellow, and orange coloured buttercream in one piping bag to achieve that effect.

Princess Barbie cake

This cake was for a three-year old birthday girl for whom I had earlier sewn this jacket.  I had to buy a new Barbie doll as I had already given away all of my daughter's old Barbies.  Underneath the skirt were three layers of chocolate cake, 2 8" rounds and 1 dome-shaped which I baked on my KitchenAid mixing bowl.

The doll actually had a glittery bodice already painted on it but I covered it up with purple gumpaste anyway to add some colour.  I used a ruffle tip #88 for the skirt.

I couldn't resist sewing up something else for this special girl so as an additional birthday present,  I made her this wool coat based on this pattern.  I think I may be spoiling her way too much...

Debutante's cake

A big red velvet cake filled with cream cheese and frosted with Swiss Meringue Buttercream. 

I was shown a picture of the debutante with the dress she was going to wear on the night of her party so my girl figurine was based on that. (Well, it's a cartoony version of her anyway.)  She wanted pink and purple flowers around her too and of course, the 18 candles.  Plus I had to make 48 red velvet cupcakes to match the cake as well.

Matching red velvet cupcakes.

Buzz Lightyear cake

Ube chiffon cake filled and frosted with creamy vanilla frosting.

To make a Buzz Lightyear gumpaste figure is surely way out of my league so it was a choice between using an actual toy figure or an edible icing image.  I settled for the icing image because I was pressed for time but really, I don't like edible icing images as they are a pain to remove from the backing paper.  This Buzz Lightyear one I ordered online was no exception.  I had followed all the suggested methods on how to remove the image but it wouldn't come off.  As the edges were starting to crack, I gave up and just cut the circle and placed the image (with its backing sheet) onto the cake.  Had to warn the celebrant's mom about it of course.  Other than that, I was pretty happy with the finished look of the cake.  I especially liked the candle holders with the Buzz Lightyear colours.

18th birthday cake

This cake was for a boy.  There were no specific requests for the decorations so what else could I have done but put a few flowers?


Chocolate chiffon with chocolate ganache filling. Frosted with Swiss Meringue buttercream.

I thought chocolate roses were the safest so that's what I did.  They're also better cause they're good enough to eat.  Tastes just like Tootsie Roll!  Gumpaste roses...I never encourage anyone to eat them.

Moulded from modelling chocolate.  I know my roses aren't very realistic but that's how I actually like them.

So...that's about it.  Hope I didn't put you to sleep (or make you hungry?) with all that boring cake talk.  Well actually, I kinda enjoyed typing up this post.  Hopefully, I'll be back sooner than later.  Till next post!