Guitar Hero Cake #2

I don't always post remakes of cakes that I have done in the past - but this one deserves it. At the end of last school year we gave Camryn's teacher, Mrs. Schott, a coupon for a cake and she decided to redeem it for her son Jackson's birthday. He saw the Guitar Hero cake on my website and wanted it. It is the size of the actual game guitar. Jackson looked pretty excited when they picked it up and they were practically mobbed by the neighborhood kids, almost all of them had Mrs. Schott and loved her as much as Camryn did.

December Orders

I will be out of town and then working on my sister's wedding cake through December 20th. I will not be taking any orders for that period of time. Feel free to contact me about future orders and I will respond as quickly as I can.

Thank you,

Jen

USC Cake

I made this cake for a big USC fan who was having a birthday. I said yes to making it before checking out the USC logo. The Trojan was hard to reproduce in fondant, but turned out pretty good. The cake was chocolate with buttercream frosting.

CTR Cake

I made this CTR Cake for my nephew who was baptized this month. His mom wanted to keep it simple, so we went with a white buttercream frosting with fondant ribbon and dots and a fondant CTR shield. The top layer was white cake with a raspberry sour cream filling and the bottom layer was chocolate with Oreo filling. I am so proud of Zack and was happy to make this cake to celebrate this special occasion.

Vampire Cake

I made this vampire cake for a girl turning 11. Her party was around Halloween and I somehow managed to forget to post this. I wanted the cake to be cute and fun, because the girl was younger. I think the cartoony vampire worked. This same week I also made another Twilight cake for a girl the same age.

Leanna's Sweet Sixteen

Soccer friends asked if I would do a cake for their older daughter's Sweet Sixteen party. She picked a very sophisticated cake - this wedding cake (the middle one) she saw on the TLC show Cake Boss.

I am not much of a piper, but I think it turned out good and I really like the large flowers. Thank goodness for YouTube instructional videos that showed how to make them. The bottom layer is chocolate with chocolate buttercream filling and the top layer is the family's red velvet cake recipe.

King of the Jungle Baby Shower Cake

A client was throwing a baby shower and asked me to make a marble cake that would match the King of the Jungle decorations she had gotten on partypail.com. This is what I came up with.

I was working on my son's Diego cake and was able to make similar decorations all at the same time. It worked out great.

Go, Diego. Go! Cake

My son, Seth, had a Diego Birthday Party. I made him this cake. It is a lemon cake with buttercream frosting and marshmallow fondant decorations. The Diego figure is a candle I bought at Michael's. He loved the cake and had a fun party.

Carlee's 4th Birthday 2009

It's so hard to believe that my little Carlee is growing up!  This is how her day went.

Eric is making it a tradition to make his kids special pancakes for their birthday breakfast!!

Cute huh!!!

 

Carlee was so happy...

 

...and ate them all!!

 

Since Carlee is into horses lately, we went for a horsey theme.

 

It's made with chocolate cake, cookies and cream filling, covered in buttercream.  The barn and hay bales are chocolate crispy cereal covered with chocolate clay.  The horse and fence are chocolate clay.  I didn't use fondant at all.

 

 

 

Can I eat it now?!!!!

 

She was impatient waiting for grandpa Jensen and her daddy to come in, so she started sneaking pieces of the fence off and eating them.

 

See...I ate them!!  Little stinker!!

 

Present time!!  She received a dress up doll from Kaitlyn.

 

A stuffed horse from Grandma J.

 

A movie from Grandma C.

 

That came with the movie!  B.O.B

 

And then she got a stick horse from her mommy, daddy and Collin!

So that's it for the family birthdays this year!! 

Stork Baby Shower Cake

I made this cake for a baby shower I was co-hosting this last weekend. My friend, April, is having her first girl after having 2 boys. I love the stork idea - when my kids were born I wrapped them up, put them in a basket, and took pictures of them on my doorstep. The cake is lemon with buttercream frosting and decorated with marshmallow fondant.

Curious George Cake

I made this cake for a 1 year old's birthday. I was worried about getting the George just right, but he turned out pretty good. Some kids were over playing the day I was working on this and when they left I noticed the tiny candle off George's cake was missing. Apparently, one of the kids had to have a taste - at least it was something I could remake in about 30 seconds! The cake was marble, frosted in buttercream, and decorated with marshmallow fondant.

Zesty Oat Groats-Black Bean Chili

This rib-sticking chili offers a hearty mix of oat groats, beans, peppers and onion.  You can also substitute wheat berries for the oat groats.  I made my own black beans and measured accordingly. 

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 large yellow onion, chopped
• 1 large yellow bell pepper, chopped
• 5 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 teaspoons chili poweder
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
• 1 15-ounce cans black beans, rinsed
• 1 14-ounce cans no salt added diced tomatoes, undrained
• 1 small can chopped jalapeno peppers
• 2 cups vegetable broth
• 2 teaspoons brown sugar (I didn't add this)
  
• 2 cups cooked oat groats
• Juice of 1 lime
• 1 avocado, diced
• 1/2 cup fresh cilantro

Preparation

1. Heat oil in a Dutch oven over medium-high heat.  Add onion, bell pepper, garlic, chili powder, cumin, oregano, salt and pepper, and cook, stirring occasionally until tender, about 5 minutes.  Add beans, tomatoes, jalapenos to taste, broth and brown sugar.  Bring to a boil over high heat, reduce heat, cover, and simmer for 25 minutes. 
2. Stir in cooked oat groats and heat through, about 5 minutes more.  Remove from heat.  Stir in lime juice.  Garnish each bowl with avocado and cilantro.

Makes 6 servings.  1 1/2 cups each

Around 386 calories per serving

Ashly and Justin Stuart's Wedding Reception

I have known Ashly for quite some time now.  Can't really remember when they first moved to our area.  Ashly has always been special to me!  She is always sweet, kind and tender-hearted.  Here are pictures that I took at Ashly and Justin's wedding reception. 

Love the shoes!! 

 

Here is the cake that I made for Ashly and Justin. 

As a cake decorator, I was totally bummed that this cake had so many problems.  First off, the doweling that I put in it wasn't cut straight, so when I stacked it, it started tipping.  So that led to catching it before it falls, totally messing up the smooth buttercream and smashing the cake on one side.  Then the layers started to shift.  Had to take the whole cake apart, smooth the icing as best I could, re-stacked it and iced it with a large basket weave tip!!  Since I know that it wasn't my best work and not the design I had planned on, I was really disappointed in myself.  I should have known better!!  Everyone reassured me that the cake was beautiful and tasted great!  So I am happy that they liked it!

 

I was very happy with the Calla lilies that I made.  This is the first time making them in different colors.

 

 

 

Cake faced!!

 

 

Opening presents.

I was so happy to see Ashly and meet Justin for the first time!!  He seems like the right choice for Ashly and they will be a very happy couple!!

Love you Ashly and Justin!!!

Wedding Entrance

I totally love this video!!!

Transformers Bumblebee

This is a Transformer Bumblebee birthday cake for Collin's friend Colton.  Bumblebee was made using a frozen buttercream transfer (FBCT).  The cake was chocolate fudge with cookies and cream filling.

BYU Cake / U of U Cake

Our Bishop's birthday was last week and I thought he deserved a cake, so I asked his kids what he was into. Pretty much BYU football was all they came up with. So I planned out a cake, then my husband said I should make it a U of U cake instead (BYU & U of U are apparently rivals). We compromised and I made one side of the cake U of U - which was to be shown first, then when the cake was turned around the Bishop would see the BYU side. His son later told me that the U of U logo was destroyed by stabbing it with a fork. I'm sure it still tasted good!

More Fun at the Fair

Just have to show you more pics from the fair!!  Kami and the kids came to watch the cake competition but of course we had to do a few other things.

First we ate some yummy fair food.  Well maybe not a big deal, but Kami and I had hamburgers, kids shared a foot long hot dog and Mark bought cajun alligator strips!!  Woowee were they spicy!!!  

After eating we made our way to the petting zoo.  That's our favorite place to take the kids!!

Here's Carlee just wanting to hug that goat.

Mark had fun petting them too!!

Collin really had fun chasing the goats!

Then there was the cake competition.  I thought that maybe everyone would get bored waiting for it to be over, but the kids had a great time!!  Collin would love to enter a cake in the show!  Too bad he still isn't old enough.

After the show, we were off to see the chickens.  For some reason, Carlee is fascinated with them!!  She loves hearing the roosters crow.

 

 Here Carlee is looking at the bunnies wishing she could hold one!!

  

Ummm Eric!!  Carlee wants one of these!!!  She just loved the miniature horses.

  

But...when we went around to the other side where the big horses are...Carlee didn't want anything to do with them!!  That's her usual stance when she gets scared or upset.  Thumb goes in and starts scratching!!

Since we had Mark home for over the weekend, he made us some baked brie!!

  

 This had a round of brie and some spices inside of some puff pastry.

Then you bake it and it comes out real gooey and yummy!

 

Tasted like a fancy cheese stick!!

This is what we did with the left over puff pastry!!  Filled with vanilla custard and raspberries.

Since Joe didn't get to be at the fair with us the first day, I had to go back with him again!  Oh that was so hard!!  We also asked Joe's sister, Lenora, to come along with us.  We had a great time!!  We were able to go through all the building that we usually don't get to when we have kids with us.  

We ate dutch oven ribs, potatoes and green beans and then later I bought an egg roll.  Mmmmm-mmmm!

Lenora wanted to go through all the livestock buildings.  I love to look at the animals too!!

 

 This was a big 'ol boy!!

 

I think Joe was embarrassed to do this!!  Bwaaaahahahahaha!!!

 

This turkey was really showing off for us!!  Hmmm...now I'm wanting turkey dinner!!  Is Thanksgiving coming up soon?

Now I can't wait for next year!!  I love going to our fair!