Baby shower cake

For a friend who decided to wait until the baby was born to find out if it was a boy or girl! A beautiful baby girl was born much to her parents delight! This cake was just perfect for a neutral cake, I especially loved making the teddy bears :)

Dairy factory cake

Glenavy dairy factory; Dad once again has been hard at work building the new dairy factory in Glenavy. Stationed in Oamaru for at least a year, he finally made it through the long hours and the long time away from mum, Yet another work place shout, Im pleased I could have the opportunity to help.

 I thought I would add in this blog, my process in making the cakes. Our kitchen is a 1948 rimu original, with about 500mm of bench space. Most of my work is done on a table that I was lucky enough to grab from work. Organisation is the key to getting my cakes baked, and some kiwi ingenuity of course!

For this cake, I had to make two large cakes, the dish is actually a roasting pan and the bowl is from our slow cooker. I couldn't find a bowl big enough in my cupboards to fit the 4x mixture!

After the cakes are baked and cooled, they are stacked on top of another and given a healthly layer of chocolate buttercream crumb coat. Smoothed out as neatly as possible, I can then layer the fondant on top.

 As a rule of thumb, the fondant should be rolled out almost twice the size of the cake, the challenge is not only my table size... its getting that large amount of fondant on the cake without ripping it! Thanks Dad :)

Deep sea diving cake

Another cake for the wonderful family up the hill! The ideal theme cake when an eleven year old boy is dreaming to become a diver.
I had instructions to have sharks on the cake - as long as they were happy sharks :)
This is my favourite cake that I have decorated, I enjoyed making so many tiny sea creatures, thanks to google once again for the inspiration.

Baby Shower cakes

Congratulations to the new mums who received these cakes. I hope you are both doing well and that your darling babies are growing healthy and strong

A merri-go-round cake for a friends friend that didnt know the sex of the baby. Thank goodness for cutters!

My workmate and I decide to surprise our colleague with a morning tea baby shower, we  found similar ones like this on the internet and thought that it would be perfect! It received a positive reaction from the rest of the department.

50th Wedding Anniversary cake

This cake was for my workmates mum and dads 50th wedding anniversary, yes 50! AMAZING.

Unfortunately I didn't take many photos of this one - it also had 9 smaller cake decorated similarly to this one that were delivered to family around New Zealand. I had a lot of fun making this one, it included fondant 50's on wire coming out of the cake. 

My workmate made a delicious fruit cake (yes I ate the trimmings and had to stop myself from eating the entire cake) and her famous mud cake for the 9 smaller ones. 

Stickman cake

Two cakes for the lovely couple who live down the road from me. This was a last minute request for their birthdays that were only days apart. Because of the late request they wanted plain cakes with a bit of writing on them. The "Manju" cake was orange chocolate chip and the "Vidya" cake was the traditional chocolate. 

Fire brigade cake

Congratulations Mum! 

Not only does my mum work 24/7 as a mum, principal and school teacher; she is also first response and a volunteer firefighter for her community. It was a proud moment watching mum receive her 3 year certificate recognising her commitment to the local fire brigade. The only women might I add! 

She requested that I make her a cake for the event and I admittedly resented this cake as the red fondant that I had purchased was not up to the usual standard. I redecorated this cake numerous times, because the fondant kept cracking and ripping. I wasn't sure of what type of reaction the cake would get, as it was not up to my "high" standard, but when the chief of the fire brigade almost cried with joy, I felt much better about it. 

A valuable lesson learnt- even though its not perfect, people truly appreciate the effort and the thought. 

The top tier is somewhat similar to the New Zealand fire service emblem, a red hose wraps around the bottom tier with the numbers 461 that represents the community fire engine.