This is my favorite cake to date.  My most recent cake is always my favorite, I don’t know why.  Maybe it’s because I get a little better with every cake I make?  That’s possible. Whatever the reason, I’m really proud of this cake!  I was asked to make it light blue with hanging seahorses.  Those were the only requirements.  I wasn’t entirely sure what I was going to do until I remembered that I had this cake stencil that I have never used.  I was so excited to finally use it because I love it.  It is so elegant and girly!  The seahorses gave me a little more trouble.  I piped them directly onto the cake using white royal icing.  I’m always really nervous when piping directly onto the cake but they came out really pretty if I do say so myself.

I love using stencils, they are a great way to apply an intricate design in a short amount of time.  I just tape the stencil to the cake using blue painters tape and apply a thinned out royal icing using a small palette knife.  Then I carefully peel back the stencil and voila! A perfect pearl swag design appears!

These gumpaste flowers were really easy to make.  I used Wilton’s fantasy flower tutorial with a few modifications.  I didn’t need a ton of specialty equipment.  Mostly I just needed heart shaped cookie cutters (who doesn’t own a million of those!) and a regular and mini cupcake pan to dry the flowers in.  If you don’t own those you can buy some muffin tins; they are super cheap and disposable!  If you want to ruffle the edges you would need a gumpaste ball tool and a foam mat.  Those are staple tools in flower making so if you are interested in making sugar flowers you may want to invest in those two tools.

The only other requirement I was given was to include a small rainbow with a pot of gold at the end.  It sounds pretty strange, but the birthday girl was surprised at her party with a trip to Ireland!  What a great gift!  I decided to sneak the rainbow on the cake board behind the cake.  Here’s it is:

I think the rainbow added a cute touch to the cake.  I hope the birthday girl was surprised by her cake and her amazing gift, I know I would be!

This cake was made for Maya’s farm themed 3rd birthday party.  It was so much fun to make!  Maya’s mom loved a cake made by Pink Cake Box and asked me to use their design as inspiration in making this kosher cake.

Here are 3 little fondant ducks, all in a row.  They are so cute!  You can also see some little ladybugs just chilling in the grass.  To make the grass, I tinted some non-dairy “buttercream” green using leaf green gel color.  Then I piped the little blades of grass using a grass tip.  It’s such an easy trick but makes such a great effect on the cake!

Here is a better look at a pig and sheep I made.  They are all made of fondant and therefore edible, but I can’t imagine anyone eating them, they are too adorable!

Here are some more little ducks just quacking along.  Happy 3rd birthday Maya!