A labour of love!

The seed of the idea for this cake came to me about a year ago after flicking through a fashion magazine  but it has taken me this long to get round to making it. It is very hard to paint onto dark colours so I covered the cake with black fondant, painted the flowers onto white gum paste and then cut them out. It took me ages!
And by-the-way how fabulous is my new cake stand?

I made this cake in particular for a fabulous wedding fair I shall be attending on Sunday. You can see all the fabulous vendors here. I will be doing a mini cookie painting class where you can paint your own!

xxx

ps make sure to say hello if you're there.

Celebrating everyday life

Some time ago I received a request to be involved in a very exciting project. Jennifer Carroll

is a blogger and online magasine editor and she wanted to create her first print version. She asked if I would like to participate and I jumped at the chance. She hooked me up with Sussie Bell a really fabulous photographer in the UK who came to take the pictures. We had a lovely day playing and Sussie came up with some really gorgeous shots. Anyway the magasine is now available...yeah!

Here is the info Jennifer has sent to me:

The magazine is 206 pages in length and is available digitally for the iPad in the Apple Store for $5.99 for a single issue, $12 for a 6 month subscription (which is 3 issues), or $22 for a 12 month subscription (which is 6 issues). The 12 month subscription brings the price per issue down to $3.67 each which is obviously the best value!

At this time we only offer iPad versions and a "Collector's Edition" print version. Online ordering for the print edition will be available a little later this week. The price for the print version is $44.99 each. 

An Android version is in the works for other tablets (like the Nook, Kindle, Samsung Galaxy, etc...) and I hope to be offering this by the time of our July/August release.

You can get a sneak preview or make your purchase of the magasine here.

xxx

Mulling it over

I thought you may like a little insight into my creative workings!

I am making some dummy cakes for a fabulous wedding show in a few weeks here. (Tie the knot at Hexton Manor, Hertfordshire, Sunday 21st April). One of my fellow exhibitors is a lovely lady from my town who I first met years ago in antenatal classes. She has since set up a fabulous business writing poems for wedding, birthdays and special occasions. Her company is called Bespoke Verse and is well worth checking out if you need a very personal present for someone special.

Anyway I rashly suggested we collaborate and I paint one of her poems onto a cake! I have been mulling over how to do this for some time now as there are some lovely poem cakes out there but I wanted to do something different and think I have found the solution.

So here are some beautiful pins that have helped me get there. 

I keep a design Pinterest board for things I see that aren't necessarily cakes but really inspire me, or spark something that I may be able to turn into a cake design. You can follow my design board here and try and guess what I'm up to!

From Minted.com

By Jamie Bauza

I can't find the source of this picture I'm afraid.

Then I remembered this book which I won for an art prize when I was at school.

You are probably looking at these images and wondering where I am going with it, well don't worry there is a plan and if it all goes horribly wrong, a plan B.

xx

Mad science party cookies

Some time ago I was asked to make cookies for a mad science party. It was for six year old boys and the brief was to impress them! This was quite tough as I only have girl children, and I know how hard they are to impress. So I started with flavours, chocolate, as a given and then some popping candy thrown into the mix.

I thought about creating a jigsaw of beakers and Bunsen burners and then decided to make test tubes. But I didn't stop there, oh no, if there is a rod to make for my back I go all out. So, I also made the test tube racks.

With two layers of cookie, a filling of ganache and popping candy and then a fondant cover, these cookies became beasts. I hope the boys were impressed by the size if nothing else!

xxx