By the sea...

Amelia is my daughter, Libby's, best friend. So when her parents asked me to do her cake, I could hardly say no. Despite the miserable, un-summerish weather we have been having in Sydney lately, her parents decided to try a Hawaiian style party at the beach. My daughter recently had a tropical themed birthday party so I was pushed to come up with an original idea.

Somehow, Amelia was blessed with a beautiful sunny day for her party (after a week of rain) and the kids had a great time at the beach! Sitting here typing this two days later, it is pouring with rain again. Oh well.

Here is a close up of Amelia, and her friend, Crabby.

The cake itself was 7" diameter, milk chocolate mudcake with milk chocolate ganache.


Happy Birthday Amelia!


Kat

Daisy chain...

This little cake was for my friend's sister's birthday. She saw a picture of this cake in a Country Road catalogue and loved it. Clearly, everything Country Road does is stylish, so I was feeling the pressure just a little.

This cake is only 5" diameter and milk chocolate mudcake with milk chocolate ganache on the inside.

I'm not sure I'll be receiving any calls from CR any time soon about selling my cakes in their stores, but it was fun to put together such a pretty little cake.


Happy birthday Jacqui as well as your family!


Kat

Summer lovin'...

This is my second wedding cake. It is two tiers of dark chocolate mudcake layered with dark chocolate ganache. It has a cascade of hand-made sugar frangipanis (about 30 in all). The blue ribbon was provided by the bride to match the bridesmaids dresses. To me, it really typifies a Summer Wedding (although technically it was right at the end of Spring!).

All the best!


Kat

Staying Alive...

Originally, I was asked for a disco inspired cake for a 50th birthday. Although I had some ideas I was keen for more inspiration. So I was sent the invitation which contained this groovy little guy...

... and the rest is history...

A close up of the groovy dancer busting a move...

Happy Birthday Paul!


Kat

Surprise!

I had the pleasure of making the birthday cake for my friend Tonya's surprise party. Somehow her crazy husband managed to fly her mother from the USA to Australia and get 80 of her friends into the backyard without her having a clue! Shock may have been a more appropriate description of how she felt.

Her cake was massive. It consisted of 2 x 8" square cakes, making it an 8" cube. It also weighed a tonne!

Happy Birthday Tonya!


Kat

My little cake...

This little 5" cake was made for Lucy, a fan of My Little Pony (ok, admit it, everyone has been a fan at some time or another). I raided my daughter's bookshelves for inspiration which really helped to get the MLP shape right. I love the soft pastel colours of this cake!

Happy Birthday Lucy!


Kat

Get ready to wiggle...

My son, Ryan, recently turned 4 and he has been talking about having a Wiggles birthday since he asked Santa for one 7 months ago. To say Ryan is obsessed with the Wiggles is a massive understatement... Anyway, thanks to my endless exposure to the fruit salad loving foursome, I had plenty of inspiration for his cake, just not necessarily enough time to apply it. But after a very late night, I managed to pull together the Big Red Car and it's occupants...

Due to time constraints (it was well past midnight) the Wiggles have their hair painted on, but I tried my best to make them look fairly authentic (including Anthony's sideburns).

I wanted to include some of the other characters too, but just didn't have the time. So I tried to include Wags and Dorothy in spirit with the details...

And of course any friend of Dorothy's knows of her love of roses...

Finally, just to prove that the Big Red Car was edible (and of course what Ryan insisted on eating) here is a photo of what my cakes look like on the inside. In this case, a white chocolate mudcake with white chocolate ganache...

Happy Birthday to my favourite (and only) son,


Kat

Up, up and away...

This birthday cake was for little Paxton, who was turning 1. His mum and dad wanted to celebrate surviving their first year of parenthood with a wonderfully cheerful theme: primary coloured balloons! (For those of you wondering what the primary colours are... they are blue, red and yellow.) Given the theme, I was allowed to come up with the design of the cake.

I love little Paxton's expression as he is floating into the sky!

And of course no theme is complete without matching cookies for party favours...

Balloons are fickle creatures, they pop or float away and often before their owner would want them to (I have suffered through many a balloon induced tantrum!) Unfortunately, I think balloon cookies and cakes would be no different... they are not here for a long time, but definitely a good time.


Happy Birthday Paxton!


Kat

Put a cork in it...

This cake was for my cousin-in-law, Maddie, who just turned 18. I was given free reign on the design with the only real advice provided, Maddie isn't a girly girl. Hmmm, there goes the pink cake with a princess on top. I think I have been doing too many cakes for the under 5s!

After some thought, I came up with this idea...

It may be a little difficult to read the label, but the bottle is modeled after the Penfolds brand, but written as "Pikes" (her last name is Pike). The style of wine is "Madeleine" with a vintage of 1993. The message on the board was a little cheeky, but her Mum didn't mind.

The cake itself was dark chocolate mudcake with dark chocolate ganache. It was 13" x 4.5" x 4.5" high of chocolaty goodness. And to my non-alcoholic taste, it was a whole lot nicer than a glass of the red stuff.


Happy 18th Maddie!


Kat

Hooray for Hollywood...

A cake for Annika, who is celebrating her 13th birthday in Hollywood style...

The colour scheme requested was black, white, red and gold. And what screams Hollywood more than walking the red carpet.

And I couldn't help but style Annika's dress up a little with some frills...

The cake itself was a 7" egg-free chocolate cake with dark chocolate ganache.


Happy Birthday Annika!


Kat

Faster than lightening...

"They call him Flipper, Flipper..." Ok, so Sophie probably has no idea who Flipper is, but she likes dolphins. It seems 9 year old girls are less into TV characters, and more into straight animals (Hannah Montanna is soooo 8).

My daughter, Libby, said it looked like this cake had lots of blue rainbows all of it. Thanks for the constructive criticism there Darling Daughter.

Happy 9th birthday Sophie!


Kat

Horses for courses

Like a large number of 9 year olds, Emma loves horses. I must admit to loving them too at that age. I would draw pictures of them and put them up on my bedroom wall. So it's not surprising that Emma would ask for a cake with a horse on it (in a field of pink and red flowers) and that I would enjoy making it for her!

And here is a close up of the pretty pony...

Happy Birthday Emma!

Kat

Dora the Bikie Explorer

Although only 2 years old, little Zoe has specific tastes. Namely Dora the Explorer and motorbikes. Not exactly an easy pair to combine... But I took a shot and came up with this:

If you are unfamiliar with this Spanish speaking superstar of the preschool world, she has a sidekick. "Boots" the monkey is aptly named as he wears bright red boots (and nothing else). I couldn't have Dora riding solo, so Boots had to join her in a sidecar.

Dora is riding over a 7" dark chocolate mudcake layered with dark chocolate ganache.

Happy Birthday Zoe!

Kat

The leaning tower of cake!

Here is a cake that has possibly aged me about 10 years in a day.

No it's not Photoshop, this cake is actually standing up by itself. However, I stressed all day that it wouldn't stay that way. I am sad to see some of my cake creations cut up. This one I couldn't wait to attack with a knife, because at least then the worry of it falling would be over. And of course it was all my fault as it was a design I came up with.

Anywho, it survived, was eaten and appreciated. Just don't ever ask me to make it again!


Wishing my good friend Pauline a very happy wonky 40th birthday!


Kat

Who wants a tickle?

This cake was for Kate, who just turned 3. She wanted a Mr Men themed cake, and her favourite is Mr Tickle (also my hubby and son's favourite). Her Mum has a tendency to refer to her as Little Miss Chatterbox and hence this cake was born:

I looked through my daughter box set of the Little Miss books for some inspiration, and came across this in Little Miss Curious:

"Why do flowers live in beds but never sleep?" she asked the flowers in the her garden.

They just smiled, knowingly.

These flowers were just the cutest thing ever so they made it onto the the cake too.

The cake itself, was a 7" dark chocolate mudcake with layers of dark chocolate ganache. Inside Mr Tickle and Little Miss Chatterbox is my homemade equivalent of LCM bars (a mix of melted marshmallows and rice bubbles).

Happy Birthday Kate!


Kat

Heel the world...

When asked to do my first shoe cake, I must admit to being a little nervous. But thankfully the cake decorating world online is a generous one, and Pink Cake Box have a detailed tutorial on their website. The brief for this cake was something with a high heel in the colours blue, silver and white. Here is the finished cake:

I'm not sure it is a shoe I would actually wear (not really a high heel kind of girl) but it looked pretty and that was good enough for me (it's about a size 8 if you were wondering). The cake (shoe box) was 6"x10" of white chocolate mud goodness (to feed about 40-50).

Also, in exciting news, this cake brought up $1500 of funds raised for Tear Australia! Considering Baking for Goats has only been operating since September 2010 (6 months), that is a great result. Thanks to all my clients!

So Happy Birthday Tracy,

30 is the new 20!

Kat

Super Mario Cake

My family are quite the nerdy bunch. My kids (3 and 5) love to game with their dad, with Super Mario Bros being a favourite. So when I was asked to make a Mario cake for Scott, there was no way I could say no.

Here is the final result:

It was only a little cake at 5" diameter (feeds about 15) and was dark chocolate mudcake with dark chocolate ganache. Yum!


Happy Birthday Scott!


Kat

To be a princess...

I had the pleasure of recreating my Sleeping Beauty cake for my little friend, Catherine, who was turning 4 in style - with a party at Fairyland! The humid weather did not like my tall behead so it had to be shortened to comply (click here for an image of what it looked like after a night of disgustingly hot weather). Anyway, the final product looked like this:

I was also asked to do some matching cookies for a take-home gift. Nothing says "Princess Party" like a pink crown!

The cookies were packaged up with a handful of Smarties for good measure.

I was also lucky enough to take my daughter, Libby, to the party, and to watch as Fairy Sparkles hacked into the cake. At least I got to eat a piece!

Happy Birthday Catherine!

Kat

High Tea

This cake was for a birthday tea party for my friend's Mother-in-law. I had wanted to try a teapot for a while so this seemed like the perfect opportunity. I decided to put some roses in for fun. A little later I wondered if I was subconsciously channeling Dorothy the Dinosaur and her love of rosy tea (did I mention my son is a huge [read obsessed] Wiggles fan?) Anywho, I guess Dorothy hosts a pretty mean tea party so who am I to argue...

Inside is a dark chocolate mudcake with dark chocolate ganache. It is quite a smallish cake, only about 5" across and made to serve 8 (with a little leftover).


Happy Birthday to Ella and Abbie's Nanny!


Kat

Leg warmers, E.T. and Wham can only mean one thing...

The 80s. Only one decade can conjure up such iconic fashion, music and movies. They talk about fads repeating but I think everything of the 80's will most likely remain unique. Who would bring back big shoulder pads and overly teased hair, fluro colours and jelly shoes? As much as all things 80's should probably stay in the 80's (except for Wham - Wham is timeless), it is a great decade for a fancy dress party. So distinctive. Men can dress as Don Johnson in Miami Vice and girls as Madonna (in the early years of course). And you all know you want to.

Well as you can tell, I love the 80s. So when I was told Andy was having an 80's themed party for his 40th, and I got to do the cake, I was overwhelmed with the possibilities. So many things I could include... but what to choose? In the end I decided to include as much as I could! And this is what I came up with:

The top tier is a 5"x5"x5" cube, and the bottom tier a 8"square, all white chocolate mudcake with white chocolate ganache. Around the bottom tier are 8 side panels, each with something I considered iconic of the 80s. They were decorated with edible markers (except for E.T. which had some painting and modelling). Here are some close ups:

But as 8 panels wasn't enough capture the 80s, I had to cover the board with more 80s memorabilia. It was so much fun thinking about the great movies and music and finding pictures to suit.

So the 80s will live on, through this cake and my iPod.


Happy 40th Andy!


Kat

PS: Did I mention that I love Wham?