Cute as a Button Baby Shower

What do you get when you make hundreds of fondant buttons and a few fondant spools of thread?

The perfect components for a Cute as a Button baby shower cake.

My friend Alisha is pregnant with her 3rd little one, and since all of us friends love to get together, it seemed the perfect reason for a fun little shower. Rachele, Emily, and Paige did an amazing job with the whole shower--food, decor, etc. I'm glad I could help out a little bit by making this cake for it too.

The mommy-to-be loves lemon cake, so I made a lemon cake which I filled with a bosenberry mousse filling and iced with a lemon buttercream. I made the various sizes of buttons and spools several days in advance to make sure they were fully dry. For the banner I piped letters onto some of the leftover buttons which were then glued onto some twine, tied to 2 bamboo skewers, and inserted through the spools of thread into the cake. I had made holes previously in the spools using a straw.

Rachele, Emily, and Paige got a lot of their inspiration for the shower from this post.

They made the most delicious pretzel bites, fruit skewers, and marinated tortelinni skewers as well as panna cotta, button chocolate suckers, and button sugar cookies.

The drinks were lemonade in mason jars with those darling straws.

I loved all these little labels. So darling in the spools!
What a fun shower. Our guest of honor is the 3rd from the left on the back row. We are so excited for Alisha's little boy to make his arrival. I'm sure he will be cute as a button!

Fondant Ribbon Roses and Nutella

I know some of you may have thought that I have gone AWOL with my baking, seeing that I haven't done anything for a couple months, but between going to a couple funerals out of town and being gone on another away rotation with my hubby for med school, baking kind of fell by the wayside. I am back, now, and am excited for some projects that I have coming up.

I finished this one for a special evening last night. It was the General Relief Society broadcast, and our stake (several church congregation groups together) had a dinner beforehand. The stake Relief Society presidency asked several ladies to bring in pedestal cakes for dessert, and I was so excited to make this one for it. It gave me a chance to try out a couple things I have been wanting to make: fondant ribbon roses and nutella-inspired recipes.

So I have made the very real looking fondant/gumpaste roses before--I really do love doing them, but they are kind of time consuming. This time I wanted to try these little beauties, and let me tell you, I am in love with them. Why? They are so EASY to make.

All you have to do is roll out gumpaste or fondant/gumtex mixture thinly (I used the 1/16th guide on my roller) and cut a 1" x 6" rectangle. Then simply start rolling it up at one end and make little pleats on the bottom as you roll. This causes the pretty ruffling at the top. After it is rolled up, cut off a little from the bottom so it is flat and can stand upright to dry. Voila! Beautiful roses in a fraction of the time.

As for my Nutella/hazelnut obsession? Well that stems from 2 trips I've taken--one to Paris where I ate Nutella and banana crepes for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for 2 days straight, and the other to Venice where I had this to-die-for chocolate hazelnut gelato (I would go back to Venice just to taste this gelato again, it was that good). I have been thinking about those trips recently and have had this gigantic craving for chocolate-hazelnut anything. That is why I tried this cake.

I first made Mel's Kitchen Cafe's Best Chocolate Cake recipe (and yes, it is one of the best I've made--moist and yummy), and filled it with a variation of a Nutella Mousse recipe I found online here. Wow. That mousse is something else. Just forget the cake and give me a spoon and a bowl full of that to eat and I'll be in heaven. My variation is posted at the end of this post (just adding in extra Nutella).

(and if you are wondering about what I iced the cake with--I made up that Amaretto Truffle Icing recipe I made earlier, but substituted 1/4 cup of the butter with about 1/3 cup of Nutella, the almond extract with vanilla, and added a few tablespoons of milk. All in all it was good--not the best, but definitely good; I just wish I could have tasted the hazelnut flavor more--has anyone seen hazelnut extract in the store? That would definitely help)

I was so happy with the final product, and the evening it was for was wonderful, both the dinner and dessert beforehand, and the broadcast we watched after. I am so looking forward to listening to General Conference this coming weekend. If you have never heard of it, I completely recommend listening in. This is held twice a year and is where the Prophet and Apostles of Jesus Christ, speak to us and give us council, advice, and support. I know you won't be disappointed.

Hazelnut Mousse Recipe

1 pkg cream cheese--softened

1 cup heavy whipping cream

2-3 T honey

1/2 cup sugar, divided

3/4 cup Nutella, melted

Beat the whipping cream and 1/4 cup of sugar in a stand mixture until the cream become fairly stiff. Transfer to another bowl.

Next beat the cream cheese and other 1/4 cup of sugar together until creamy. Add honey to your desired sweetness and mix. Microwave the Nutella for about 30 seconds, then add this to the cream cheese mixture and combine well.

Carefully fold in the whipping cream to the cream cheese mixture. Cover and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes or until the mousse sets up.

Birthday Bash and Fried SD card

I've been in Oregon for the past month--another medical school rotation for my hubby. The girls and I tagged along since I have 3 brothers up in Portland and places to stay and family to see.

My sister-in-law Ellen had a birthday while I was there, and I just couldn't pass up the chance to make her a birthday cake. It was a surprise. I kept it a secret from her for a couple days, doing all the decorating at my other brother's home. This was an idea I had seen on Wilton awhile back and have been wanting to do. It is their Make Some Noise cake idea. It was a super cute idea using 3 tiers of cake. I made my tiers using a 7 inch pan, although they used an 8 inch pan in theirs.

This is Ellen. Love her to death. She is one of the funnest people to be around. Happy Birthday!

Now for my sob story--I took some darling pictures of this cake--all set out nicely, lighting just right, neat angles, etc--and what happened? . . . my SD card got fried in my computer. Yep. All the pictures were gone. So all I have to show for this cake is what others took on their phones. So sad. Sorry the pictures aren't the best. I hope you understand :)

I filled the bottom of the cake platter with chewy sweet tarts. They didn't last long--all the kids kept swiping them from the platter . . . okay, adults did too. I guess we can't blame everything on the kids.

Just a couple notes on this cake idea from Wilton--it uses quite a bit of fondant, so come prepared--especially if you want the white "frosting" between each tier to look thick and fluffy. I didn't use Wilton's imprinting roller for the texture on the swags. Instead I tried the texture tiles from Duff's line at Michaels. They worked ok--not great, but did the job more or less. I have yet to buy and use one of Wilton's textured rollers, so I really can't compare it to that yet, but I'm sure they would work fine.

Have a great day baking, napping, or doing whatever it is you enjoy doing!

Look Whooo is Having a Baby

As soon as we got back from being away for a month in Boston, I got started right away on a new cake project (it's so nice being home with all my cake supplies at my disposal--I've missed them!).

Hmmm . . . what could I possibly be doing with this owl cake . . .

and these owl cupcakes? Any ideas?

Well, take a look below:

A darling baby shower thrown for my dear friend Rachele who is due in about a week with her second little boy. The theme was "Look Whoooo is Having a Baby" with owls as the main decorating motif.

All I can take credit for was doing the cake and cupcakes. Erica was the one in charge of the event and finding all the ideas. Unfortunately, she went into labor early with her own baby and had to miss the shower, so our other amazing friends finished putting it all together, and we had a wonderful evening together.

I tried to keep the cake in blues, green, and browns to go with the color scheme that Erica gave me. The cake was a lemon cake with blueberry filling. It was truly scrumptious (but I really am very biased towards lemon cake, and you can't go too wrong with a blueberry filling).

I wish I could say my cupcakes were that good too, but I was very disappointed. They may look cute, but it was a new recipe (for a key lime pie cupcake) that I will not be doing again without some huge alterations to it. It turned out very dry and heavy. I'll have to work on that one.

All the decorations on the cake and cupcakes were from modeling chocolate I had made up. I just rolled out the chocolate and cut out my shapes using an exacto knife (except for the leaves and flowers--I had a cookie cutter for those).

Emily found the idea for these darling veggie shot glasses here

And she made these scruptious rolls. Their the "Magelby's rolls" for any of you up in Utah who knows what that is. You can find the recipe here.

These were probably my favorite part of the food table. The waffle cones with fruit is so eye catching and mouth watering. It just looks so fresh and yummy.

These darling punch stirrers were made by Paige (along with the delicious punch). The owls are from here and the idea from here.

And here is the cute guest of honor and mommy-to-be. Congrats, Rachele. We can't wait to meet your new little man.

What's New, Cupcake?

This has been the month of cupcakes for us. The reason being? We've been out in Boston staying with my brother and his family for the entire month of April while my husband has been doing a medical school rotation here. Since we are away from home, and I am without all my cake decorating supplies, I've focused on cupcakes.

Well, I also got this book several months ago and have been dying to try some of the ideas:
It is the sequel to "Hello, Cupcake" that I've raved about before. Like it's sister, this book is packed full of incredibly creative ideas. Want to see a peak at some of the ideas? Well, here are 2 of them that I did this month:

"An apple a day keeps the doctor away"--what a cute gift to give someone feeling under the weather. They are also the best gift for a teacher, and that's what these were made for. My sister-in-law requested I make these for her to take to her kids' teachers. It is amazing what you can do with a cake mix, mini-doughnut, some frosting, and candy.

You could also give these to someone special with a note "you are the Apple of my eye."

The next one I tried out was this darling cupcake cake of a golf course. I threw it together last minute and was unable to find green cupcake liners like it called for, but se la vi (I probably just totally messed up that spelling).

It was for my brother's 37th birthday. My favorite part?--the white gumballs covered with white non pareils. They are the cutest little golf balls.

There are so many other ideas in this book--some darling, and some quite disgustingly funny (like the cockroaches and rats ideas). This book has made my favorites list, and will be well used in the future.

Sugar and Spice

Last month I helped host a baby shower for my friend Melanie who is expecting a baby girl any day now. Since it is her first girl and she has been all boy and blue until now with her little 2 year old toddler, we wanted to inundate her with pink for this shower. We used a color scheme of 2 shades of pink, brown, and white--so girly and so perfect for the shower. The theme was "Sugar and Spice." We did a savory and dessert crepe for the meal with a cookie buffet for dessert. Mmmm...let's just say that I was in heaven eating the banana and nutella crepes that my friend Marci made. That sure takes me back to my quick trip to Paris while on study abroad. I was in charge of the cookie buffet. I had found some recipes I had been wanting to try, and of course, they had to involve some kind of pink. The first was a recipe I found here on Bakerella's site. I bought a few bags of the valentine's M&Ms in February so I could do these. Yes, they did come with red ones too. And darn-it-all, they just didn't match so I had to get rid of them...oh, don't worry, I didn't let them go to waste ;). I discovered the key to baking these cookies so they look good and colorful--when making up the cookie dough, save a handful of M&Ms out. When you roll the dough into balls and put them on your cookie sheet, stick a few more M&Ms around the top. Those will then stay on top of the cookies when they back, so you can actually see the pinks and whites.

The other 2 were a Meringue drop that I colored half of them pink and left the other white, and a Chocolate Crinkle cookie that I rolled in pink powdered sugar before baking. I had some difficulty getting the powdered sugar pink, but with some determination and a ziplock back full of powdered sugar and some pink food coloring paste, I finally got it pink.

What else goes better with cookies than some milk? I loved how this matched the whole color scheme.

We had such a fun time visiting together and seeing all the cute, girly baby clothes that Melanie received. With 2 girls of my own, it's safe to say we love pink around here.

Dinosaur Birthday Cake

It was birthday time again. This time for my friend Melanie's little boy. It was a dinosaur themed party, using the colors red, lime green, and light blue. I wish I could claim this as an original design, but for this cake I went to google images for inspiration and fell in love with a cake from the Artisan Cake Company in Portland, OR, and I ended up making one similar to it.


As you can tell from my last few cake adventures, I have fallen in love with making and using modeling chocolate. This time I molded my dinosaurs and trees out of it. I feel like a kid playing with Play-doh sometimes. Everytime I work with the stuff my older daughter wants to "play Play-doh" too (although she wants to use mine because she's discovered that the stuff actually tastes good).


I have to admit that my triceratops was my favorite of all the little guys that I made. Too bad they're not still around. I'd want one as a pet :) The sand was made from crushed up graham crackers--pretty good sand, but two days after doing this I saw on Cake Boss that they use brown sugar for sand. Duh--that would have looked so great if I would have thought of that earlier. Next time, I guess.


I know, I know--my little sea creature/loch ness monster dude isn't really a dinosaur, but he was just too cute that I had to include him. You see him eyeing that little cake?! He brought his appetite with him.


I found the trick to the waves was to ice that part of the cake in blue, then put dollups of white icing next to the edge of the blue, and using a small angled cake spatula, pull the white down and into the blue.

Happy 2nd Birthday, Andersen! Here's to another great year.