Pea in the Pod

My Co-worker Tracy's due date is the same date as my birthday. Let's hope she hangs on until then... but Tracy is ready for this baby. Doesn't she look great! We had a celebration at work today. This cake was inspired by others I saw on cake central. The peas are FBCT's the rest is just buttercream. The black outline didn't really cooperate on the FBCT and smeared, which was annoying. Overall I'm happy with the way the cake turned out. I struggled a bit with the coloring as usual. I couldn't decide what shade of green, oh the dilemma...

The base of the cake with buttercream icing:

My first attempt at a face wasn't a success. I changed the tip from a 4 to 2 and it worked.

Temple T

My colleague Patrick is moving on to medical school at Temple. I made a Temple T in his honor which was a FBCt and added a few advil's (take two and call me in the morning) as well as a little bandaid which was fondant. My favorite part was the EKG strip going around the outside of the cake. Patrick has a wonderful and unique sense of humor (Which has been appreciated over the years!) and is one of the most even tempered people I know- He is going to make a great doctor! I can say I knew him when...

turning three with lighting mcqueen

My good friend and childhood neighbor Kris came over for a lesson on how to make a FBCT. Her son is turning three and the theme of the party is Lightning McQueen. It was a lot of fun hanging out and making the FBCT. I love when my cake world and my friend world come together...

Here is Kris- Hard at work...



Filling in color


An action shot of filling in color


The Finished back side of the FBCT. She put it on ice, packed it home and drove it safely home....


Kris did all of the work on this cake. Here are some action shots of icing the cake and making the background for lightning...



Line drawings work best to make FBCT (frozen butter cream transfers)






Placing the candle on the cake...


A happy customer!!! He can't wait to eat a letter of his name!

chocolate sunflower

I made an attempt at creating the sunflower that Liv Hansen does so well in her book Whimsical Bakehouse. I have to admit I've sort of been obsessed with this sunflower. I loved it when I first saw it and wanted to give it a try. I took this cake to the family reunion/ 4th of july picinic as well... What says summer better then a sunflower? Cake was red velvet with buttercream icing smoothed with the viva paper towel method.

Outlining the sunflower with chocolate:


Finished filling in with different colors, this is the back of the sunflower:


Here is my work space- my coffee table, while watching T.V...


Side view- made little leaves to go around the edge. Was going to pipe long tubes of grass but ran out of buttercream icing and time...

4th of july hamburgers

This year's 4th of July party was a Shellaway family reunion... 100 of my relatives in one place- what could be more fun??? I love my family and spending time with them. To celebrate I made 4th of July "hamburgers". I got the idea from Bakerella, http://bakerella.blogspot.com/2009/06/fast-food-fun.html . She is another new cake maker obsession for me. She also makes very creative "cake pops". keep your eye out for my attempt at making these in the near future...

They were super easy to make. Just one cake mix for the cupcakes, one brownie mix and three colors of butter cream icing. You should make these for your next party. Make sure you visit the bakerella blog for instructions. Below I've outlined some assembly tips.

Naked Cakes (I cut the brownies using a 2" circle cookie cutter)













My cupcakes had to compete with many many many other desserts. We had so much food at this reunion it was a little overwhelming...



Here is one happy customer... My 2nd cousin Tara's son. He was soooo cute and ate multiple hamburgers :)