Here are my latest projects.

Christmas Cupcakes

How can I forget that I made these cuties? These are some cupcakes I sent to my daughter's school for their Christmas party. It was fun making all the different fondant pieces -- makes everything look so colorful.

Pink Polkadots Gift Cake

This is a small cake I made for a girl baby shower. It was accompanied by matching cupcakes. I wish I had a picture of the display it went on. It was So pretty. The lady that ordered it is an up-and-coming and very talented party planner. It's always a pleasure to make things for her.

Hello Kitty Cupcakes

I bought a fondant mold online for a special order I received a few months ago. And, I guess Hello Kitty is really popular, because another friend asked for some Hello Kitty Cupcakes. I used a really soft pink for the icing because I couldn't imagine seeing a bunch of dressed up gals walking around with dark pink on their teeth and tongues. It ended up being a good call. I was told the birthday girl LOVED them.

Cupcake Sampler

Here's a picture of a Sampler 24-Pack of cupcakes that I made for a friend who owns a bakery. There's coconut, vanilla,chocolate, Oreo and lemon flavors.

Snowflake Wedding Cake

Here is the latest cake I made. It was for a friend's wedding of 50 to 75 people.

Apology to my Blog Readers

Hello, I'm sorry I haven't posted anything lately. Work has been busy and my baking requests consistent. I have lots of photos to share but I'm blogging from an iPad and apparently can't use their image browser to load them. I promise to post pictures of my latest work very soon. And better yet, in the coming month or so I plan to move from a blog forum to my very own website! I'm very excited about that endeavor and have enlisted the help of my brother-in-law who just so happens to be a very talented graphic and web developer. Yay! This is Norma saying not bye, but so long for now.

Jungle and Under the Sea

I made this cake for my niece. The design was all her idea! She sketched it all out on a paper for me. I tried to make it as close to her concept as possible. This cake was SO fun to make and it was a bit of a challenge for myself. Happy Birthday Nats!

50th Wedding Anniversary Cake

I made this cake for an acquaintance of mine. She called me two days before, wanting a two tiered white fondant cake to celebrate her parents' 50th wedding anniversary. I was very excited because I'd never done a cake for anything other than a birthday, AND I had just bought a new Wilton stencil set I was DYING to try out.
Well, I definitely gained experience using the stencils. It was actually quite fun!
I made the cake from "semi-scratch," meaning I used cake mix as a base and then doctored it up using a recipe I found online. The result was a very moist and workable cake. It called for Almond extract but I wasn't sure any of Kathy's guests would have peanut allergies, so I opted to leave it out. It was delicious anyway!
She brought me the cake topper the night before. I think it was hilarious!

It's All About Giving Back

I'm so excited to share this news! The principal at my daughters' school asked if I could make cupcakes for the church jamaica. I said YES! So I made 100 mini cupcakes. I had been dying to try out a new cupcake flavor. Plus, I was curious to see if there is a market in East LA for fresh non-store-bought cupcakes. So, what better chance than this?
I made four kinds: Irish Cream, Lemon Daisy, Loaded Chocolate and Vanilla Buttercream.







All I can say is WOW! I never thought that custom cupcakes would be such a hit! As soon as my dad exited my car with trays full of cupcakes, people began calling out to him asking how they could get their hands on one, or two, or three... My dad is such a character! All he said was I don't know, I'm taking them over there to that booth. Then what? People started FOLLOWING him! OMG! Here are some pictures of the ladies rushing the cute cuppies.






Here is the principal, proudly holding a tray of goodies! She was so thankful, and I was so happy to make them for such a good cause!

Graduation Cupcakes

I made these cupcakes for my cousin's daughter's high school graduation. I looked around online and kind of combined my favorite aspects of different graduation cupcakes I found.
My cousin said the graduation gowns were going to be light grey so I got rolling with the fondant. Making the caps was actually very easy. For the base of the cap, I rolled out some fondant and used my pizza cutter to cut 2 inch strips at about every 1/3 of an inch. Then I just pinched the two ends together and set them aside. For the top of the cap, I rolled out my fondant thick, about 1/5 of an inch. Then I used my pizza cutter again to cut squares, with one of the sides at a bit of an angle.
With that drying, I filled my piping bag with brite white buttercream frosting and tip 1M and I swirled one after the other. Then, I positioned the base of the cap an an angle, making sure to dig into the frosting a little. I filled the base with some more frosting and placed the top of the cap on.
For the diploma, I rolled the fondant a little thinner. I cut rectangles about 1"x1 1/4" and just rolled them like little tacos. It just seemed like something was missing because the diplomas were white and were sitting on white frosting. So, I remembered my cousin said that the other color was navy blue.
I cut thin strips of dyed blue fondant and rolled them into mini-roses. Then, I secured them with frosting.
Finally, I mixed some green frosting and piped leaves on either side of the rose. My cousin, her daughter and all the guests loved them.

Two-Tier Fondant Hello Kitty Cake

My friend Crystal asked me to make a Hello Kitty Cake for her daughter Nadia who turned 6. It had been a while since I made a cake. I was really looking forward to it. I think it came out rather nice.
At first, I was debating whether to ice it with frosting, but although fondant is more challenging and is physically more strenuous, I prefer the look and now I'm glad I chose it.
I went to Michael's and bought the big box of white fondant. I swear this is the last time I use the Wilton brand. It's just SO hard to knead and dye. When I watch the tutorials, the Satin brand looks so much more pliable that I know for sure I'll be using that brand next.
So, this is the cake I was asked to make. My friend was rather flexible. She said to make something "like" it, so I decided to eliminate so many of the colors to make sure it all tied together. Just like when designing a piece of marketing material or a webpage, the less colors and mixes of font types, the better - as far as design goes anyway.
I had the wires in my hand at the store already, but even then, I just wasn't completely convinced. This cake looks real busy and the way I remember Hello Kitty from the 80's is thick lines and simple illustrations.
Crystal said she wanted strawberry filling. I used the crushed strawberries they sell at Costco. They're already sweetened and I think it gives the filling a sweeter flavor than fresh strawberries. So, in this cake, there's three layers in each tier. I made the mix from scratch and baked each layer individually -- no cutting. This kind of back-fired on me because when I was stacking the layers, I noticed that they were not very soft. I hoped that once I put the icing and filling in and around, they'd soak a little over night.
My schedule went like this:

• Friday: Bake, fill, stack, frost and cover in fondant.
  
• Saturday: Make fondant decorations and add final touches.

On Friday, I worked from 10am till 11:30pm, with breaks in between of course. Then Saturday, I was able to wake up at 8am, have breakfast and then get to work.
I think the result was worth it. The party was to start at 12:30pm and I was done by 11am. My sister, Terry, did the honors of delivering this massively heavy cake.

Oh Finally!

Finally, a chance to bake! My cousin asked me to make her some cupcakes. She is throwing a party in the jungle theme and had an exact idea in mind. Well, here is the result...

Piped green "shrubbery" with an animal sucker I bought from Oriental Trading, and a tree made with a pretzel.

Have I Lost My Mojo?

I can barely remember the last time I baked! It was some cookies I made for my kids' teachers and my husband's work - for Christmas! I know to some of you it doesn't seem like a long time, but to me-- ages.
I have to think of a new project. Williams-Sonoma had this cute cookie-cutter set on SUPER sale. I just opened it a couple of days ago (the box sat in my kitchen for over a week!). It was better than I expected.

So, stay tuned for my next baking adventure!

My House for my friend Donna

Donna, here's an updated picture of our house. I received your letter and sketches. Thank you!!! I am so excited to get started. I like what you did with the porch area. By looking at this picture, you will see that we're kinda heading in the right direction. I measured it and it's 8 feet wide. If you click on the picture it will enlarge it for you.

Cupcakes for Benefit

This Sunday my nieces and my daughters volunteered in a special event to raise money for children with Down's Syndrome. They were working the cupcake booth, so what better opportunity to practice some more!
These cupcakes were easy. I used the Cinch cake mix in yellow and chocolate, which are both very tasty. Then I decorated them in three different ways to add a little variety.

Cookie Class Part 3 - Fondant Cookies

Today was the last of our 3-day cookie course. We were asked to bring some cookies, colored fondant, the cookie cutters we used for the cookies, some Crisco and some corn syrup. Getting this ready was a breeze because I still had all the different colored fondant from my daughter's birthday cake. I'm glad I stored it properly in Ziplock bags.
I had never used fondant to decorate cookies and I must say that I was impressed. The result was a neater, more professional-looking cookie.
As additional decoration, we used the royal icing from the 2 day of class.

Sunflower Tuscan Cupcakes

My cousin Marianne enlisted me to make cupcakes for a Tuscan-themed party she will be having to celebrate her mother's and niece's birthdays today. She decided on a sunflower design and I got right to it.
I started baking the afternoon before. A lady from cookie class told me they sold a really good cake mix at Fresh & Easy. So, I stopped by on Friday and I was pleasantly surprised. I got two of their Cinch brand Deluxe Moise Yello Cake Mix for $1.09 each. Then, a few items adjacent to that, I spotted this Fresh & Easy brand Dark Chocolate Cupcake & Cake Mix. Being a mother and wife to chocoholics, I grabbed this one too. I think this one was about $3.
The cupcakes baked really well. They had a different look and texture than the ones I'm used to baking. I couldn't resist and had to taste one. I took one of the yellow ones and was pleased. I could taste the fluffiness of the egg a little, but it was really moist and tasty!
I started thinking these cupcakes would be too plain to just serve like that with icing on top. So, I got to thinking how I could make these "Tuscan." What exactly is "Tuscan"? I did a little research online and finally got inspired. I've never filled my cupcakes before and I had a cake filling I had purchased from Fabulous Cakes. It was this Bavarian cream. I am convinced this taste would go so well with the flavor of the cupcakes.



I wanted to add a little more jazz to it so I took out my handy-dandy Brandy! I mixed about an ounce into the Bavarian cream. I liked the outcome.



I filled my bag with the Bavarian cream and put a filling tip (Wilton Tip 230) at the end. Filling the cupcakes was a breeze! That little tub was enough for all 50 cupcakes!

Next came the decorating. I mixed my colors: golden yellow with a bit of orange to get the rich sunflower petal color; dark brown and a bit of black for the center.

I filled one bag with each color and used a Wilton Tip 22 for the center and a Wilton leaf Tip 67 for the petals. The decorating came very easily.


I packed the cupcakes to-go in my Cupcake Courier. I love this container! It holds 36 cupcakes and the rest I just put in my rectangular cake/cupcake holder. Now, I'm ready to go!

Tried the Cookies at Home

My daughters and nieces are having a bake sale and asked if I'd make something for them to sell. I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to get some practice decorating cookies.
It was easier because I had some royal icing left over from class. This cookie shape worked really well. My hand was steadier than it'd been before.

Cookie Class

This was a real busy weekend. Not only did I make a 3 tier cake for my daughter's birthday, but I blogged about it during the fact. The party, which was on Saturday, was here, at my house. I did all the shopping and cooking, but my hubby did help with setting up in the backyard (thanks!). Our last guests left just after midnight. I have to say that it was a wonderful evening.
So, what do I have planned for Sunday? Some well deserved R&R? No way! I'm going to the 2nd of my 3 day cookie class at Fabulous Cakes.
This weekend we learned how to color flow on cut-out cookies. Our instructor gave us the recipe last weekend. I had a cookie after class and I've got to tell you - it's delicious!
The recipe is so simple, I will post it but I've got to give credit to Wilton. It's theirs:
1 c. butter
1 c. sugar
1 lg. egg
1 tsp vanilla
2 tsp baking powder
3 c. all-purpose flour
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar with electric mixer or stand mixer. Beat in egg and vanilla. Sift baking powder with flour. Add flour mixture, one cup at a time, mixing well after each addition. The dough will be very stiff. Blend in the last of the flour. Do not chill dough. Roll dough out 1/2 inch thickness. Dip cutters in flour before each use. Bake cookies on ungreased or parchment lined cookie sheet on top rack of oven for 7-9 minutes or until cookies are lightly browned around the edges. Cool completely before icing.
I love going to this class. It's a small one but there are women there that are very talented. I always get lots of tips from them and their work always inspires me. Here's what mine looked like. I know I still need lots of practice, but I'm very eager to do that.