Big Helper

We're all glad JR is back from his school and deployment, but I think Zane especially was craving some time with Daddy.



And yes, JR is doing his wood working in my living room. It's a good thing he cleans up after himself.

Lopsided Cupcake Cake

I made my eighth cake this week. Be warned: this is a long post. My friend Grace was planning a "Mad Hatter Tea Party" themed birthday for her daughter. She had seen this cupcake pan in the store, but she wanted it to be lopsided to fit with the craziness of the theme. She also loves fondant, but we both thought covering the whole thing in fondant wouldn't look right so the bottom is in fondant and the top is iced with buttercream.

So first (Monday night) I baked the cupcake cake and 2 9-inch cakes in red velvet. I didn't need 9-inch cakes, but that was the size pan I had available. I tried to go get some more, but the Exchange only had 9s and 10s. After I took them out and they cooled a bit, I wrapped them well and put them in the freezer.

Tuesday, I took them out of the freezer and started cutting away. First I made sure all my cakes were flat. Then I placed one of the 9-inch cakes on top of the lower portion of the cupcake. I angled to top and cut a flat circle out of the middle to support the top of the cake. I also cut channels in the sides to match the cupcake.

These are the two separate pieces.

I thought that was quite a bit of cake on the bottom so I cut the lower piece in half and "glued" it back together with some white buttercream.

Then I wrapped up the bottom of the cupcake and put it in the fridge.

I took the top of the cupcake and the other 9-inch cake out of the freezer. I cut the bottom of the 9-inch to fit on top of the other 9-inch cake. That way the top of the cake would be supported and would actually be flat on bottom even if it looked lopsided. I cut the top flat and cut the sides at an angle to line up with the top of the cupcake piece and to overhang the other 9-inch.  I then "glued" the top 9-inch to the cupcake top, wrapped them up, and put them back in the freezer. I took the bottom of the cupcake out of the fridge, added the lower 9-inch to it (with icing) and then re-wrapped it and put it back in the freezer.

Wednesday I made some white buttercream and frosted the entire bottom portion of the cake to prep it for the fondant.

I had intended to smooth the fondant into the indentions to keep the cake looking like it was a cupcake in a paper liner. That didn't work. Since it's a Mad Hatter theme, I decided to paint the fondant. I forgot to take a picture of the cake before I started painting so this picture has two stripes on it already.

I wanted it to show the brushstrokes and have vivid colors to be reminiscent of the Disney movie. I chose green and yellow, as he has a yellow coat and green shoes, pants, and hat. I decided to do stripes to help it look like a paper liner. Here it is completely painted.

I'm afraid it looks a bit weird. I hope it looks better when it's all put together. Well...I don't know how likely that is. It's going to have bright pink icing on top and blue "sprinkles." I just hope Grace and Celeste like it.

Thursday morning I put the top of the cake on, frosted it bright pink, and put on the sprinkles. They're just white chocolate and blue food coloring poured onto a sheet and then cut out with a circle cutter.

Here's the finished product: one Mad Hatter lopsided cupcake cake.

Puzzler

Zane likes puzzles. Here are a few pictures of him doing his first 100-piece puzzle. He needed a little help to get going so I showed him how to do the border first and then the middle pieces, but he did most of the work himself.

Another Baby Shower Cake

This cake was made for a sister in my ward named Correna. She gave birth to her third child, a little girl named Zoey.  We weren't sure if there was going to be a shower or not, as she gave birth just a few days before the shower and was released at the time the shower was scheduled to start. We still had the shower; she was just a bit late. I made her cake after looking at a few pictures she had sent me. Each cake I make, since I've only made a few so far, gives me something new to try. When I made this one, there was no fondant on the island so I was forced to try homemade marshmallow fondant. I've been wanting to try it, but I didn't have much of a choice. I did have one box of premade fondant in my cabinet, but it wouldn't be enough for the whole cake. Correna attended Melanie's shower and liked the idea of chocolate for one layer and marble for the other.

This picture is just the cuttings, obviously. I, again, had forgotten to take pictures until JR reminded me. The bottom layer was marble and was supposed to be covered in chocolate fondant with circles in different shades of pink. 

The fondant I made turned out just fine, but when I added the chocolate, it all messed up. I gave up after a while and just mixed some chocolate with the fondant I had in my cabinet. Thank goodness I had it.

 Here it is after I trimmed the fondant and attached the circles.

 The top layer was supposed to be a marbled layer with white and two different shades of pink. Here's me mixing one of the pinks into the fondant. I really don't know why I took a picture of this. It looked cooler in person, I guess.

It turned out really well until I put it on the cake and smoothed it down. Apparently marshmallow fondant is more malleable than the store-bought stuff. When I smoothed it on the cake, I mushed all the colors together. It didn't turn out how I wanted, but it still looked okay.

I made roses out of the same fondant and put them on top. Then I added some leaves and white flowers as well.

Then I added a ribbon to the bottom of each layer. Here's the finished product.