Crawfish Pot #3

Here is my third "Crawfish Pot" cake! It was just picked up this afternoon. The cake is a 10" brown sugar butter cake (one of my faves) with toasted coconut caramel filling and iced with a coconut buttercream. The phrase means "The Joy of Life".

I really enjoyed creating these because of the semi-realistic look they had. I was really able to stretch myself and get creative with how I constructed these cakes. By this third one it was a breeze and I had my system down! That's always a good feeling compared to doing one for the first time and being so worried as to how it will come out.

The customer also informed me when she picked up the cake that she might have to order one more for her husband's birthday! Thanks to everyone for all of the kind comments on FB.  I appreciate your support in my baking endeavors!

Overwhelmed

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/run/7606696.html

As I sat here reading the above article that was posted on "The Woodlands Marathon" page I became overwhelmed with a sense of gratitude, thankfulness and awe, mixed with a tinge of "unworthiness", at how far God has brought Rick and myself.

I am truly amazed, on a daily basis, at how effortless our Lord is bringing things together for Launch Multisport (Rick's company) to host The Woodlands Marathon on March 3rd of 2012.  That's not to say there isn't work involved but the Lord has opened every door that needs to be opened and closed those that need to be closed.

If you'd have asked me last year what I thought we'd be doing this year it probably would have been somewhere along the lines of "working."  That's it.  Working.  Not much vision, hope or fun there.  But now, after seeing what has transpired and what I know is ahead in our future I can assuredly and confidently say, "pursuing our dreams and fulfilling our purpose!"

Not only are we pursuing our dreams but we are pursuing a healthier lifestyle...something else we've always wanted but up until about 3 years ago, never figured how we could.  It wasn't enough of a priority, we were too lazy, our lives were too busy...whatever excuse we chose to spit out at the moment it wasn't the right one.  Because there really is no excuse for not making healthy choices whether it's exercising, choosing to eat a salad instead of a burger or spending time at a park instead of in front of the tv.  We ALWAYS have a choice.

For these things I am overwhelmingly grateful to my God, my Savior, my Friend and Heavenly Father.  Thank you.

My Mom's Birthday

I'm really tired but I wanted to leave you with a little something before I go to wonderful land of Nod.

My mom's birthday will be next weekend but being as it's father's day weekend we decided to celebrate it a bit earlier.  Today!

I finally made my mother a cake!  I've been "caking" for over 2 yrs now and I hadn't made a cake for my mom.  I made one for my mother-in-law in '09.  Does that make me a bad daughter or a good daughter-in-law??

Anyhow, I made a cake and we celebrated my mother...complete with Karaoke!  She loved it!  We had a great time, all of us "kids" made it, we had fajitas and there's always a bunch of laughing because my family is full of comedians!  We love to act silly and make each other laugh.

My mom loves cheetah print and her and dad have a Harley which they ride whenever they get the chance so I thought I'd combine the two.  Throw in a strawberry cake with fresh strawberries and cream filling and you've got a pretty good thing going!  At least in my humble opinion.

What's something special you've done for your mom?  I'd love to hear how you celebrated her birthday!

As always...God bless, leave some love and thanks for stopping by!

Crawfish Boil Cakes and More

Hello everyone!  I’m finally making the switch over to a Mac!  I’ve been a PC for years but have been wanting a mac when I started doing digital scrapbooking and getting more into photography about 7 yrs ago.  See, you learned two new things about me that you probably didn’t know!  So please bear with me as I hone my skills and maybe change the look of our blog.  I will also be publishing a web page soon for my cakes, but more on that later.

So, in the beginning of May I created a "Crawfish Boil" cake for my SIL, Rachel.  It was the first one I've ever done and ended up being very please with how it came out and how easy it was to put together.  Everyone LOVED it and even the chef from the restaurant wanted one of my business cards in case he "has any events he could use help with!"  Sweet!  I started with my go to vanilla buttermilk cake recipe from Sky High, Irresistible Triple-Layer Cakes.  Then I filled and iced it with a chocolate buttercream frosting.  We're not talking about greasy, coat your mouth, shortening based frosting...we're talking real (organic) butter and sugar.  The good stuff!  Is it rich?  YES!  Is it sweet?  Yes!  But that's how it's supposed to be and that's also why you only need a small slice.  Back to the cake.  I created a little crawfish for the top with some corn and potatoes made out of fondant.  I dusted the sides of the "pot" with silver to give it that metal look. and added handles to the sides and flames around the bottom.  So, without further a-dew...

I happened to show my neighbors this cake because they are originally from Louisiana and after they saw it she wanted to order TWO of them!  One of them I made last weekend for a graduation party.  They need something a bit bigger so that's why it doesn't look as tall..

The third one I'm doing on Wednesday so you'll just have to wait to see that one.  

In between the two of these I did two other cakes and on Saturday I did another baby shower cake for my other neighbor. 

First we have a Princess Castle cake for a sweet one year old of some friends of ours.  It came with a dozen cupcakes.  This was also my first castle to make so I was a bit nervous at fist but I did my research and at the end of the day I thought it was "fit for a princess".

Then I made a German Chocolate cake as a "Thank You" gift for someone.  I. LOVE. THIS. CAKE.  :-)

Doesn't it look absolutely delicious!  I can not have this kind of cake sitting around because I will unashamedly stuff my face until it's all gone!

Okay!  The last cake I did this weekend was a baby shower cake for my other neighbor.  These are also the neighbors that I made the birthday cake for with the twin brothers turning 60.  Anyhow, this cake was an 8" vanilla buttermilk cake filled with a fresh strawberries and cream filling and frosted in my white chocolate swiss meringue icing.  It is delicious!  (I always have scraps and leftover icing to taste)  The design and colors I took off the invitation.  They haven't found out what they are having so it had to be a "neutral" kind of cake.  I think it was simply beautiful!

So that's been my month of May and beginning of June.  Throw in Mother's Day,  vacation, attending the first IronMan Texas here in The Woodlands (ALL DAY), my sons end of school party and my hubby being gone Memorial weekend and I say I'm glad May is OVER!  Now time to focus on June!

As always God bless, leave some love and thanks for stopping by!  Oh and I hear thunder so maybe we might get some more much needed rain!