Been a bad blogger!

Well as you can probably tell, as it's been about 2 months since my last post, I've been a very busy caker! Lots has happened since my last post, including completing my very first tax return! How exciting! We've had wedding cakes, retirement cakes, rude cakes, birthday cakes and cupcakes galore! Here are a few of my favourites from the last 2 months!

Penguin Cake!

Beatrix Potter - Peter Rabbit Christening Cake

Square baby girl Christening Cake - Lilac and Pink Clothesline theme

Baby Girl Christening Cupcakes

3 Tier White and Purple Draped Wedding Cake

Surprise Skydiver Birthday Cake

Super Mario Cupcakes - LOVED making these beauties!

Round Cherry Blossom and Dove themed cake

Baby Boy 1st Birthday Number 1 Cake

Pretty Quilted & Rose Cupcake

Baby Girl Baby Shower Cupcakes

In The Night Garden Round Cake

7 Tier Wedding Cake (before decoration)

7 Tier White and Pink Wedding Cake - Loveheart & Princess theme

Baby Boy Number 1 Cake

3 Tier Ivory and Burgundy Wedding Cake with Gerberas

2 - 3 Tier Topsy Turvy Cake - This cake was made for a friend who is a massive fan of a series of books by Nalini Singh called the Guild Hunter series. The cake is done in the them of the books including the 2 main characters, red roses, grey & gold marble and white brick.

Emo Cupcakes - Pink and Black, hearts, skulls and bows

Bow topped cupcakes!

Some simple Thank you cupcakes

3 Tier White and Blue Wedding Cake - Roses were all made by hand and dusted with silver.

18th Birthday cake! Drunk boy, lots of lager and half eaten pizza! Such a fun cake!

 More thank you cupcakes

Mixing Decks Cake

In The Night Garden Number 1 Cake

I'm been stocking up on lots of new tools and things too, it's been like Christmas around here. I've invested in (after some time lusting after them) an air brush and an edible ink printer. Unfortunately I just haven't had the time to try them out yet! I've bought some pretty stencils in and am very much looking forward to giving them a try. I had to buy some new fabric for backdrops for my cakes as I'm going to be advertising my wedding cakes soon and am planning on doing a few new styles of cake and of course I needed some lovely new patterns to inspire and display my cakes in the best way. Look at the prettiness!

I even bought some extra to make a curtain out of for my kitchen door. I think it's going to look gorgeous and I can't wait to see the first cake displayed nicely with that beautiful fabric!

I've been trying my hand at figure making too. All of the figures in the cakes above were handmade by me (excluding the topper on the Ivory wedding cake). I even made a cake with 18 different animals on, all were made by hand. Hard work but so fun to do!

I have an exciting couple of weeks coming up. Why? Because I have a very quiet week this week with only 2 customer cakes but 2 birthday cakes for my nearest an dearest, my lovely hubby and my 'baby' girl Ellena! Hubby normally asks for a birthday trifle, he likes cake but as you'd expect there's plenty of cake in my kitchen most of the time so he can have cake anytime; but this year he asked for a cake. I know what theme I'm doing I'm just trying to come up with a design for it! It's going to be coffee and Bailey's flavour (and I'm thinking about making a trifle inspired cake too, yum). Ellena is turning 3, hence 'baby', not technically a baby but she's still my baby! We're having a cake smash photo shoot for her and I'm so looking forward to it! I just know the girls will love being able to get stuck into one of my cakes for a change! Watch this space for some new exciting cakies! Oh and a week off too with the family!

Thanks for reading, it won't be so long next time, I promise!
Sam x

Ahhh rest!

I have a couple of days off baking now. Pure heaven after the manic fortnight or so I've just had! I plan on spending most of my time out in the garden enjoying the beautiful weather we're having! We have a rabbit run being built at the moment so it's just nice to all be out in the garden. We've got chickens too who are laying beautiful eggs! I had hoped to use in my yummy cakes but it looks like you can't use unstamped eggs in baking which is a shame. I always get my eggs direct from a Norfolk farm which are stamped, they're gorgeous eggs to so I'm happy to keep using them, it would just be nice to be able to say that the eggs I use have come from pampered free range pet chickens! Never mind, just means there's more for us to eat instead!
I've done a couple of very pretty cakes this last week, a very girly birthday cake and a spring Wedding cake. I just love doing girly cakes, they're so much fun! This one was a Vanilla Giant Cupcake decorated in plenty of pink and glitter!

Us bakers are having fun at the moment trying to find safe glitters to use as lots of people were using safe 'non-toxic' glitters on their cakes. This meant that although they were completely safe to be eaten, they contain no nutritional value and are not digested, therefore, are now deemed in-edible. There seems to be a lot of confusion with what can be eaten. I've been doing my research and have found a couple of brands who make edible glitters and dusts. I have been making my own glitters using lustre's mixers with caster sugar too. The glitters and confetti I have in stock are all considered safe by the FSA as they are made from modified starches and food additives (E numbers). I make a vast majority of my own decorations for cakes as well and always do so from fondant icing which is completely edible and rather tasty too!

Here's a picture I was sent by a customer to show what design they'd like for their wedding cake (please note I do not own this photo and I did not make the cake pictured)

As you can see it's quite an unusual cake with the divider under the top tier but also quite pretty! The bride wanted to have daffodils on the cake as well as the butterflies.
Now, here's the one I made, before and after the daffodils were added.

What do you think? The bottom tier is chocolate, the middle is vanilla and the top is fruit cake which they wanted so it could be kept. I wanted to get a picture of the cake with and without the daffodils as I think they really change the look and feel of the cake. I decided to go with less decorations than the example picture and went for differently place butterflies. It's a shame you can't appreciate the effect of the butterflies and they delicately glittered and looked gorgeous in the light.

Well I really should be getting on!
Thanks for reading, Sam x

Pink and Gold

Hi!
Today I made another 18th birthday cake for the same girl who had the topsy turvy cake a couple of weeks ago. This cake was needed for her party! This time we went with a simple 18 cake with a pink and theme. I went with quilted sides with gold balls and gold handmade roses. The number 1 is a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting and the 8 cake is chocolate with cream cheese frosting. I really hope she (and her guests) enjoys this cake too!

Sam x

Pretty Cupcakes

Today I have made a box of cupcakes for a friend to give to her mum. She asked for them to say 'Mum' and to be pretty. We went for pink and white with some shimmer, I think it was a good choice! She chose 6 Vanilla Cupcakes which I decorated with shimmering 'Mum' lettering and used some handmade dark pink edible roses and leaves and sprinkled with some pink and white sugar pearls. I really pleased how they turned out and I actually think the rose topped cakes are the nicest ones I've done. I do love a nice girly cake! Take a look, let me know what you think!

I will be doing these again for Mother's Day this year, I know my mum would love them so hopefully lots of other mums would be pleased to receive them too!
I'm now thinking ahead to the other 'holidays' this year, the next being Valentines Day! I just realised, I have no Valentines related cutters though so I had better have a look for some and think of some cupcake designs to do! I have some Valentine's card making and craft things so I might just have to get a start on them when hubby is off from work again in time for February 14th!
thanks for reading, I'll be back soon!

Christmas Bakes!

I've had a few very busy days. I am finally sitting down for the first time in what feels like an age of caking! I've tried out a new recipe this week of Buttermilk Cake. I was slightly concerned about it's texture while it was cooking but in the end it turned out perfectly. I have one more day of baking ahead of me before the big day, the rest of the time will be spent finally finishing my handmade gift tags and Christmas cards aas well as wrapping far too many presents! I shall leave you with some pictures of the past weeks works!

Sam x