Happy Mother's Day

Tomorrow is Mother's Day...and I wanted to bake something special for my mom-in-law. I figured that a simple bow/ribbon from fondant paste would perfectly decorate the cake I had in mind. 

But to my unfortunate...as I went into the store I normally go for my cakes ingredients, I was dumbfounded for a moment as the main ingredient to fondant paste was sold out. Knowing that I would be in short of time to look elsewhere, I had to think quick or I need to trash my thoughts of baking a cake for Mother's Day. Then, it suddenly struck me that I had always wanted to bake a carrot cake. I took out my PDA phone for the recipe which I had been saving for quite some time now and quickly grab for the ingredients that I am still lacking of at home.

So, it's Carrot Cake with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting...(again, I failed awfully on the frosting and decorations...hehehe).

A slice of the cake, anyone? *grin*

To all mothers and mothers-to-be out there, HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY...to those are not mother's enjoy celebrating the day with your mother.

Surprise farewell Gift

Surprise…surprise!

This is a surprise farewell gift to my dear friend a.k.a my twins who will be leaving the company soon. It is with a bittersweet feeling to see her leaving us… I am sad that she is leaving the gang but then, I feel glad that she found a much better job elsewhere. So I am happy for her too.

Anyway with help from a trusted comrade, we tried to give her a surprise by leaving the cupcakes on her desk, yet somehow we failed even before dropping off the cakes! See the word ‘tried’? Well, it seems that she managed to catch us in the act when I dropped the cakes to the comrade early in the morning. It is just by mere seconds that we might have missed her, but unfortunately she came to work just in time to witness that! Ha! But then again, I am happy that she loved the cuppies and the little-no-so-surprise-anymore surprise on Monday morning *grin*.

Resting on bed of flowers

Enjoying her sweet times

Carefree

Relaxed

I thought of this sweet girl as the topper to represent her. Just look at how the girl is enjoying her sweet moments while relaxing on bed of colorful flowers...that is exactly what I am hoping for my 'twins' in her new endeavors.


So farewell YL…I wish you best of luck in your new adventure and best wishes.

 Full view

~Cheers

Moo-Moo Cuties

Aren’t these two little Moo-Moo cuties adorable? 

So as to the recipients too. This Moo-Moo couple is a long belated wedding gift for my uncle and his dear wife. Though they have been married for a while now, but it’s just recently that they took their wedding photos…and that actually triggered me to make them a bride and groom topper in the shape of cow. Why the Moo-Moo then? That is because they were both born in the year of cow!

The handsome groom

The pretty bride

I had their initials and bright colors cut-out flowers to go along with the topper. 

Groom's initial with a little bow tie

Bride's initial with little flower

Simple decor

To my uncle and his dear wife...I wish both of you happiness and happily ever after!

Happy Birthday Ashley

January 10th, 2010 - The birthday of my baby niece who now has grown to be a young little girl. Felt just like not long ago that she were brought to this world, but she turned 8 this year. She is getting prettier and better in talking. In fact, she actually asked for Power Puff girls figurines to go with her cakes after knowing that she will be getting a special birthday cake, but this time I had to admit that I got a little lazy to make her fondant cuppies.

Instead my mom insisted on making a new recipe she learned...Cream Cheese Cake with Fruitty fillings. That does sounds interesting (yummy), hence I gave in. Mom will be baking the cake while I hold the responsibility of decorating the big cake with whipped cream. The birthday girl has few requirements...she wants chocolate rice on the side of the cake, butterfly/flower on top and sugar silver balls. Now this is something new to me. I never decorate with creams before. Gosh!

The Cream Cheese cake turned out great but my decorations failed miserably *LOL* Oh well, at least I gave my best...but I guess I better stick to my home-made fondants. Felt that is a lot easier to work on than creams decorations!

So Ashley....HAPPY 8TH BIRTHDAY to you. Promise will bake you some cuppies with cartoon figurines next round.

Not an easy task to get the chocolate rice to stick on side evenly

Chocolate characters on top with the sugar silver balls as requested

Love,

Small little gesture...

I had these two little tortoise as a small token of appreciation to my good friend who is nice enough to let me use her apartment (and air-conditioned usage) to keep all of the cupcakes (for my hub's cousin wedding) prior to the wedding day.

Knowing that there will be many guest going in and out of the groom's house, I had to find some place else to keep my cake (safe) till the morning of wedding day. Coincidentally, this good friend of mine owned a unit within the same block...definitely the perfect hiding place for my little precious *grin*

So YL...thank you for allowing me to use your house *smile* Hope you enjoyed the cake (though not much)

Cheers~

December Project: 3-tier Wedding Cupcakes

Year end is always the most busy time of the year…It is the time of the year when people are busy attending gatherings, parties and of course WEDDINGS!

6^th of December was an auspicious day for many weddings events and my hub’s cousin is one of the happy groom to have his wedding on this date. I wanted to give the wonderful couple a surprise wedding gift but was little worried that my ‘wishful thinking’ would not turn out the way I hope it would be. Of course, I’m talking about baking them little cupcakes on a 3-tiered cake stand. I guess this is what I would call as "December Project"

I started to assemble the 3-tier cake stand from raw material, the week before the wedding day. My second attempt finally went success and I am happy with the outcome of my own creation of cupcake stand.

3-tier Cake Stand

Then finally is was D-Day to start working on the fondants to create little bride and groom couple figurines. Knowing I had little time to complete 40 cupcakes with designs, I changed my commonly use recipe from Homemade Rolled Fondant to use Marshmallow Fondant instead.  At least I can save a little time from kneading the MM Fondants. However, I was still contemplating over the look of the bride and groom up to the very last minute till I started to mold them. I was somehow worried that the figurines would fall apart before I can actually put them on display on the wedding day…but I guess all my fears are just worries after all, the outcome turned out well!

Front details of the little bride and groom

 Back details of the little bride and groom

I set up the cake stand in the middle of their dining table the moment when the groom went out to fetch his beautiful bride. The location was so strategic that the cupcakes was the first thing that guest would see when enter into the house. I can see that arriving guest are admiring while at the same time snapping pictures of the cakes for keepsake. The happy me of course glad that the bride and groom loved this surprise gift from me when they returned from the bride’s house. The cupcakes was quickly snatched up and finally left with only five cupcakes for the bride and groom to savor.

Up for display

Little pink flower on heart shape

 Simple daisy cut out

Little pink and white MM Fondant flowers scattered on the base for the final touch

To the newlyweds, wish both of you many great moments with each other and have a wonderful marriage. Cheers~

Wedding Bells

October 17th, a joyful occasion for all of us – a cousin of mine had her wedding on this auspicious day. I wanted to give her something special, so I thought of some home bake cuppies as a gift to wish her and her hubby a long lasting marriage. For weeks I have been contemplating over the sugar paste designs and what-would-be the suitable topper before I finally set my eyes on a cute couple clad in traditional Chinese wedding outfit. That is it! The theme would be red and white, to not complicated the designs with too many colors. As for the cake flavor, they are orange flavored with freshly squeezed orange juice and zest to bring up the fragrant. The center is then filled with home-made orange jam which created a juicy texture when one sunk their teeth in.

For personalized touch, the groom's and bride's initials were added

Close up shot of the cute couple

One big and 7 small sized cuppies all nicely packed

I had another set of cuppies for my in-laws who were in town during the weekend. It was getting late at night and I was a little tired so I just had a couple teddies hugging each other accompanied by six small sized cuppies.

Lovey Dovey teddies hugging each other

Close up shot

I am happy that the cuppies and sugar arts turned out well!

Cheers,