Pooh Bear and Honey Pot Cake

This is a chocolate Winnie the Pooh Bear cake made for a little girl's second birthday and decorated with gold, black, red, blue, and light blue buttercream icing.  The honey is actually Wilton's decorating gel.  I didn't know how it would turn out, but the gel had a shine to it and was drippy, so it actually worked well for honey.  The cake didn't have a large enough area to write the birthday message, so I wrote it on the cake board and decorated with small honey bees for a more finished look.  The price of this cake is:

Buttercream Icing per Batch: $2.55 x 2.5 = $6.38  (yellow, black, red, blue, and gold)
Chocolate Cake:  $1.93
Wrapping and Plating: $4.88
Labor: $6.00 per hour x 3.5 = $21
Total: $34.19

Big Red Barn Cake

This big red barn cake was made for a little boy's 3rd birthday!  It is a yellow sheet cake decorated with red, white, black, yellow, pink, brown, and green buttercream icing. 

A lot of times I get an initial idea in my head of what I want a cake to look like and when I start decorating the idea grows.  For example, on this cake I sent an initial sketch to the mom of a red barn with a cow peeking through open barn doors.  As I started decorating, I decided it would be fun to dig out the window and the opening ot the barn to give the cake some dimension from which I could build out the chicken sitting on a hay stack and the cow peeking out the door.  Once I had two animals, I figured I had to have a barnyard dog and the tree just seemed like a good idea to have near a barn. 
Thus, cake decorating is a very organic process for me that grows as the cake take shape.  This is why I offer an initial estimate for the cost and then a final cost when the cake is finished because if I think the cake needs more detail I'm going to add what I think it needs. 

The cost of this cake was:
Icing: $2.55 x 3 batches: $7.65 (1 red, .5 black, .5 green, .25 yellow, .5 white and pink, .25 brown, )
Cake: $1.93 x 2 = $3.86
Wrapping: $4.88
Labor: $6 x 5 hours = $30
Total: $46.39

Birthday Cookie

This is a butterscotch and dark chocolate chip big cookie I made for a birthday party with white, chocolate, and red buttercream icing.  The chocolate is AMAZING even if I do say so myself!  I make and decorate the cookies fresh so they are not wrapped since they don't have to freeze as the cakes do. 

The cost for this cookie was:
Icing: $2.55
Cookie: $5.72
Plating: $1.05
Labor: $6.00 per hour x 2 = $12
Total: $21.32

Another Tractor Cake

Normally, I won't repost similar looking cakes, but I made some detail changes to my tractor when I made it for another little boy, so I broke my rule.  It is still a yellow cake with white, green, black, yellow, and orange buttercream icing.  I wrote the "Happy Birthday" message and the #3 differently on this cake, and I'm not sure which way I like better!  The cost for this cake was:
Icing: $2.55 x 1.5 batches = $3.65
Cake: $1.93
Wrapping: $4.88
Labor: $6 x 2.75 hours = $16.5
Total: $24.59

American Flag Cookie

I made this cookie for a Memorial Day BBQ.  It is a chocolate chip cookie with milk chocolate chips and decorated with blue, red, and white buttercream icing!  It was a huge hit!

Rapunzel Cupcakes

These are the cupcakes made to match the Rapunzel Tower.  They are yellow cake and decorated with buttercream icing in all the colors from the tower: purple, pink, orange, yellow, white, green, lavender, gold, brown, teal, and periwinkle. 

Moth Cake

This cake was made for my husband's work potluck and is a replica of the company logo.  It is a yellow cake decorated with purple, yellow, green, and pink buttercream icing.  The challenging part of this cake was trying to blend icing colors similar to a digital image of the logo.  Thus, there are two different shades of yellow-green, and yellow-pink which made a peachy/orange color.  I enjoy the challenge, so ti was a fun cake to make.

Mickey Mouse Club House Cakes

These cakes were made for two year old twin boys having two different Mickey Mouse Club House parties!  My son doesn't watch Mickey Mouse Club House, so this was another job I researched quite a bit.
The flat cake is a yellow 9x13 cake with blue, green, black, red, yellow, and white buttercream icing.  I flat iced the sky and hill with the rest of the decoration being stars.  I like to use different textures on my cakes because I think it makes them more interesting.  The price for this cake was:
Cakes: $1.84
Wrapping: $4.65
Icing: $2.43 per batch x 3 = $7.29
Labor: $6 per hour x 2.5 = $15
Total: $28.78

The two layer cake took a bit more thought.  The client really wanted Mickey ears to top the cake which could easily have been done with fondant icing.  I don't like fondant icing though because it doesn't taste good, and I see no reason to put something on a cake that doesn't taste good!  Especially a little boy's birthday cake!  Instead I iced two chocolate chip cookies and put them on the last minute before I delivered the cake!  They stood up, looked like Mickey ears, and were yummy!  The bottom layer was a 9" round chocolate cake topped by an 8" round yellow cake decorated with red, yellow, blue, and black buttercream icing.  The price for this cake was:
Cakes: $1.84 x 2 = $3.68
Wrapping: $4.65
Icing: $2.43 per batch x 4 = $9.72
Labor: $6 per hour x 3.5 = $21
Total: $35.05

Dinosaur Cupcakes

These are some of the cupcakes that accompanied the dinosaur for the little boy's third birthday.  Some were chocolate and some were yellow cake, but they all had the green, orange, and blue buttercream icing used on the dinosaur.  

Dinosaur Cake

A little boy turning three who loved dinosaurs got this cake and 18 matching cupcakes.  His mom wanted a train party, but a few months before his birthday the little boy decided he liked dinosaurs more than trains!   This yellow cake was made in my dinosaur cake pan and is decorated with orange, green, blue, adn white buttercream icing.  He is holding a package with a special birthday message for the little boy!  The cost of this cake and 18 cupcakes was:

Icing: $2.43 x 2 = $4.86
Cake: $1.84 x 1.5 = $2.76
Wrapping: $4.65
Labor: $6 x 3.5 hrs  = $21
Total: $33.27

Blue Cupcakes

These regular and mini cupcakes were yummy additions to my son's dual first birthday party with his best friend.  They are yellow cake with light blue buttercream icing swirled on top and dark blue, sea foam green, and white buttercream dots.  The mini cupcakes are perfect for a child's hands.

Blue Bunny and Pick Up Truck Cakes

My son's favorite snuggly for bedtime is his blue bunny, so I made his first birthday all about blue with his cake being a replica of his "BB."  Blue bunny is a cut from a yellow 9x13 cake with light blue, dark blue, black, sea foam green, and white buttercream icing.  Unfortunately, cake did not seem to be his thing this year!

One of my son's best friends was born the day before him, so we had a dual birthday party for the boys!  I made another blue bunny for my son and a blue truck for his friend.  The truck is cut from a yellow 9x13 cake with white, light blue, black, yellow, red, dark blue, and sea foam green butter cream icing.  The detail on the truck includes tire tread, a side mirror, doors with handles, headlights, break lights, a front license plate with the little boy's initials, and a rear license plate with #1. 

Birthday Big Cookie

My husband loves my cakes, but he loves my big cookies more, so for his birthday he got a huge chocolate chip cookie decorated in blue, brown, and white buttercream icing.  Yum!

Rapunzel's Tower Cake

A friend of mine has a little girl who turned five this year and was totally in love with Tangled (who can blame her - totally cute movie)!  She wanted Rapunzel's tower for her cake, so of course I tried to make it as movie accurate as possible.  This to date has been my most challenging and rewarding work, so I'm going to write a bit about the process. 

I started my research by printing pictures of other Rapunzel cakes online that I liked as well as the toy tower you can buy at Toys R Us.  These were a good starting place, but I wasn't thrilled because I thought they lacked authenticity to the movie.  Fortunately, I had Tangled saved on my DVR, so I found a few rare places where only the tower is shown, took pictures with my Nikon, and enlarged them for printing.  This process allowed me to better analyze the colors and detailing on the original tower.  Though an accurate research process is lengthy I consider it my time and do not charge the client until I actually start baking. 

The cake is cut from a yellow sheet cake and is iced in many buttercream layers.  The lavender was flat iced first followed by building out the window with remaining cake, flat icing the white window background and icing the window itself in gold.  I wanted to build out the window so I could pile the hair up and spill it out over the side of the window.  Next, I put shingles on the roof in a dark periwinkle, stones on the tower in dark purple, and bricks on the chimney in gold.  Finally, the tower received it's finishing detail with the green grass; a green and brown tree; braided yellow hair falling from the window pile to the ground; green vines; teal spires; another white and gold window with more hair peeking out; the gold balcony; and lots of flowers in pink, orange, periwinkle, white, and teal. 

I was so proud of my work, but the best part was the little girl's face when she saw her birthday cake.  Her smile lit up the room and she danced around the kitchen singing "I'm Rapunzel!"  My job just doesn't get any better than that.  Her little brother was so excited he asked for a Rapunzel cake for his birthday! 

In addition to making this cake, I also made 48 cupcakes for the party.  This has to date been my largest and most expensive order laid out as follows:  

Icing 6 batches x $2.43 = $14.58
Cakes: 4 x $1.84 = $7.36
Wrapping, Cake Board, and Foils: $3.65 + $1 + $1 = $5.65
Time: 9 hours x $6 + .5 hour x $3 = $55.50
Total: $83.09