JR turns Thirty!

As I mentioned on this post, two Friday's ago was my big bro's thirtieth birthday (it was also the first day of the RWC).  We celebrated this special day on Sunday over lunch at Daikoku Japanese restaurant in Takapuna, followed with more celebrations at his place afterwards.  It was a great day!  Delicious food + family = HAPPY TIMES!  And of course, there was cake!  Or shall I say CAKES!

For a few weeks before my brother's birthday, I had his cake in the back of my mind.  I have pages of doodles sketches, and everyday I managed to come up with a new plan.  Talk about confusing!!  By the time I had to make the cake, I managed to narrow my design ideas down to three...then as I was making it, it changed yet again.  Talk about indecisive, huh?  No, I really just had trouble with my original idea and it didn't quite work out with the cake I had in mind.  Sooo, I had to start over, as in from the baking!  I was actually in tears on Saturday because I hadn't slept yet, and my plans weren't working as well as I hoped.  Maybe it was the sleep deprivation that was finally affecting the outcome of my work?  Anyway, I didn't give up (as defeated as I felt that day).  I actually had to repeat my fave verse to get me back up again, "I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength."  I knew there was another design my brain was yet to unveil...and sure enough, there was.  Thank you Lord!!  I went from rock bottom to the top of Mount Everest!

The first cake I worked on was the shoe - the most challenging in terms of design.  But I was grateful I only had to make one, as opposed to two like these MJ tip-toe shoes I made last month.  I wanted to recreate these basketball shoes my brother loves.  They are the Concept 1 APL (Athletic Propulsion Labs) shoes.

Click to read more and to see the cake after the break...

August in a glimpse...

Good morning everyone!  Hope you had a great Fathers' Day weekend!  My hubby sure was spoilt with love, laughter, and cake!  Will share more of that tomorrow, so be sure to come back.

Today I am delighted to 'begin' a monthly summary, where I'll be posting little glimpses of what I shared with you each month.  Not sure why I didn't think of this sooner.  Enjoy!

CUTEST

I started August off with sweet cake pops, which I renamed PARTY POPS!  A sweet treat made from left over cake scraps and covered in sprinkles!  Yum-oh!

COOLEST

Then we shuffled the streets of London with dancer Kimberley from Vibe One, who asked for a special cake delivery for her bf in Auckland!  How sweet!

MOST PINTEREST-ING

Of course goes to the Pinterest Challenge we did with Katie, Sherry, Lana and Emily.  Everyone shared amazing work!  Good stuff guys!

OLD SCHOOL

...goes to our trip down  memory lane where we visited my life as a dancer in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia! Good times!

RANDOM-EST

...has to go to the 'deer' action we had on our street.  Random and cool!

FASTEST

...goes to the little quickie action in the car with a cake!  There's gotta be a first for everything, right?

BEST MUSIC

...goes to DJ Kiwa who rocked the house!

BEST DANCE

...goes to this awesome dancing!!

BEST ROMANCE

...goes to the 'Love' cake I made for my hubby xo

MOST CHALLENGING

...undoubtedly goes to the MJ tip-toe shoes cake.  I can still remember the sleep deprivation, lol!

MOST SIGNIFICANT

...goes to the colourful confetti cupcakes made for my eldest son for making significant progress in his reading.  Well done! :-)

MOST THOUGHTFUL

...goes out to the bake sale held at Delish Cupcakes where I, along with so many other volunteers, baked lots of goodies to raise funds for those affected by the Christchurch earthquake.

MOST FASHIONABLE

...goes to Fashion Friday, where I shared some of the latest fashion trends I'm diggin'.

MILLENNIUM AWARD

...goes out to my Uncle who turned 50!  Made him a vanilla bean cake to celebrate via skype.  Love technology!  

MOST COMMITTED

...goes to the first wedding cake I made!  This is the first of many more wedding cakes to come, I'm sure.  :-)

and last but not least we have...

MOST CARING

...goes to the SPCA Cupcake Day!  

Well, there you have it!  August in a glimpse!  I can't believe it's now September!  Yay, my favourite month ('cause it's my birthday month, hehe, and it's SPRING).  See you all again soon for more cool cakin' and creatin'!

xo

Good Monday

Hey guys!  Hope you're all having a good Monday so far!  First of all, I would like to apologise for not posting much last week.  I planned to but was very busy with my most challenging cake order yet.  Remember the carrier pigeon cake I made last time for dancer Kimberley?  Well, she ordered a second cake from me, but this time it was for her dancers.  Kimberley is currently travelling in Europe, shuffling from London to Barcelona, and who knows where she's off to next!  Now, before I get into the cake, here is a pic she sent me taken in the streets of London.  This is what she wanted me to create for her dancers...

She originally envisioned a 2D cake, but me being me (forever challenging myself) thought she wanted a 3D version.  When I mentioned the idea to her she got all excited about it (I was secretly stressing - lol).  I began to plan how I was going to achieve this tip-toe action...let's just say I was sleep-deprived for a while.

Once I had some plans drawn up (mainly in my head) I approached my Uncle to help me with building a base for it, since he had all the cool tools needed for this project (like Tim the Toolman Taylor from Home Improvement, and Handy Manny, hehe).  We sat down and discussed and sketched some ideas until we decided on one that we thought would work best.  I have some process pics on my phone, but I can't find the cable to upload them onto my computer...when I find it I will show you the pics.

This cake took a lot out of me.  I was really exhausted!  No sleep and a lot of trial and error in the process.  I'm just sooo glad it turned out pretty cool (for me anyway).  Sure there are things I would do differently next time had I had a bit more time to work on it, like creating the creases at the bend of the shoes, brushing off the excess icing sugar on the shoe laces and soles to give it a more streamlined finish, etc, etc - next time, with more time!

The lovely Antoinette (who works for Kimberley) collected the cake from me, but when she arrived I was still finishing it off...and so she waited very patiently.  She was watching me do my thing, talk about pressure!!  She also ended up helping keep my twin boys from attacking the cake.  They just kept running towards it.  If you don't know my boys, they are cake-aholics, but I refer to them as my cake monsters.  They love anything CAKE!

Click after the jump to see how the cake turned out...