Clockwork Lemon

Breakfast Themed Birthday Cake

Another year, another birthday. I'm lucky in that I share the same birthday as my lovely friend Rachele which means we get double the celebration and have an excuse to throw a birthday party with double the guests, food, and (most importantly) cake.

Last year we made a big batch of cupcakes but this year I wanted to take the time to design and decorate us a themed cake.


During our party planning session we came up with a couple of party themes and ultimately decided that we wanted to have a breakfast themed party.

Not a party during breakfast time, nor a breakfast-for-dinner party, but a party with breakfast themed appetizers, mimosas, and a caesar bar. While we were brainstorming the snack bar I doodled these happy breakfast food characters to use for the cake. I wanted them to be dancing around the outside of the cake holding hands.

 Sorry for all of the poorly lit cell phone photos to follow, all of the cake work was done in the late evening. (Fact: it's important to do decorating work late at night while watching Mystery Diagnosis or Hoarders  on YouTube for maximum creative inspiration).

Brush Embroidery Sugar Cookies

Although I often confess my love for decorating techniques that involve lots of finicky little steps and time consuming details, there's another category of techniques that I love even more: ones that are easier than they look. Brush embroidery falls squarely into that category, it looks complicated and time consuming, it seems like it requires advanced piping skills and years of practice. But it's not. And it doesn't. In fact, all of these cookies in the photos were my first attempt at brush embroidery. As long as you have the right tools and a bit of time set aside it's a very forgiving technique.

I'd first seen brush embroidery on some cookies on Pinterest. The pin didn't lead anywhere helpful and I wasn't even sure what it was called. Luckily, thanks to the magic of the internet all it took was a bit of poking around on Google and Youtube before I came across this video tutorial. It's such a straightforward technique that the video doesn't even need verbal instructions.

With Valentine's Days approaching I decided to draw up some pink, white, and gold designs to work from to give away as pretty, edible V-day cards. Then I baked up some heart shaped sugar cookies and whipped together a batch of royal icing.

Pinwheel Cake Tutorial

 Spring is supposedly on its way but when I look out my window all I see is little flurries of snow and a grey sky. Its probably a bit unrealistic to expect green grass and flowers in Alberta in February. I won't be vacationing somewhere warm any time soon so I've been staring at spring inspired photos and fabrics online to get my fill of pinks and greens and yellows. 

I have been reading the fabric and quilting blog Nana Company even though I don't sew or quilt. Her fabric choices are so pretty that I love checking out what sort of cute stuff she is working on. When I decided that I wanted to make a spring themed cake with pinwheels I used her creations as my inspiration for the colours and patterns.

 

 

 

New Blog Design and *Giveaway* CLOSED

 

 I've been wanting to give my blog design a bit of a face lift for a while now. In fact, I think I mentioned it in my New Year's blog post as one of my goals for the year. It may have taken me a while to get around to putting it together but at I still got it done within the year. So check that one off the 'ol to-do list!

For my banner, buttons, and the lovely custom illustration on my recipe index page I enlisted the help of the very talented Carrie who owns the shop CagedTomato.  I had booked marked a whisk drawing of hers a long time ago and wrote to her asking if she could use it in a banner for me. Check out her shop which is stocked with adorable food themed illustrations!

 

Gum Paste Butterfly Tutorial

I've had a number of requests for a tutorial for the butterflies that I covered my mom's birthday cake with. They aren't difficult to make! All you need is the right supplies and you can make your own colourful sugary butterflies to decorate cakes, cupcakes, or even cookies with.

Lemon Blueberry Butterfly Cake

For my mom's birthday this year I knew that I wanted to make her a cake covered in colourful butterflies. It wasn't just an excuse to use all my new edible glitter and shimmer powders, my mom loves butterflies and bright cheerful colours. If she were to spontaneously turn into a cake somehow this  is how I imagine  she would look.

 

I actually started the butterfly decorations even before I knew what flavor of cake I was going to make. I needed time to debate between chocolate with a coffee icing or some sort of lemon cake.

Wellington was fascinated by the butterfly making process. He monitored the process very very carefully during both evenings that I worked on them.