Ballet shoes & Ballerina cake

These cakes were made for two sisters who are into ballet. The birthday cake is decorated with the ballet shoes as a topper, elegant lacework kind of swags and a ribbon bow. The ballerina cake design is an inspiration from the Debbie brown book, just that it is made to look more apt for a 5 year old.

Both the cakes are covered with vanilla fondant. All the decorations are made of fondant.

Memoirs of a cake

I participated in the Wilton's 80th Anniversary "Past & Present" cake decorating contest which was held on 14th June at Darien, IL.

My entry was named "Memoirs of a cake" which represented how the cake decorating styles evolved through time. The lower half of the cake represented the "Past" with the lower most tier having ruffles, trellis, swags as the decorations whereas the second lower tier with ornate shapes in cornelli lace and bordered with the Lambeth style. The upper half of the cake represented the "Present" with the non-traditional funky styles of decorations topping off with a gumpaste floral spray.

The celebrity judges for the contest were Colette Peters, Mark Seaman, Debbie Friedman, Laura Ragano. This entry did not win any place except the Award of participation. But, it was a wonderful experience to see others designs.

These were the comments from the judges for my entry.

Judge 1 : Good use of stages of theme
Judge 2: Very nice use of colors & patterns
Judge3: Very creative use of theme
Judge4: The roses are lovely. The detail of the lattice is done very well. The overall style of the cake is very nice and flowed very well.
Judge 5: Nice expression of old & new techniques. Floral spray is beautiful.

Colette Peters demonstrating brush embroidery technique.

Animals cake

This cake was made for the birthday of a 2 year old girl who is fond of different animals. I was specially requested to include dog, cat, squirrel, fishes & birds in the design. I added additional frog & bunny enhance the theme. The cake was designed to look like a walk into woods with lots of trees, stones,fences & a bridge by the water.
View of the back of the cake.
A closeup of the top tier
Closeup of the bottom tier which has the squirrel eating nuts beneath the tree. Fishes jumping in the water with water splashes. An eagerly awaiting stork & a frog by the water stream.

All the animals were hand molded out of fondant. This was a little unusual kind of theme. I truly enjoyed designing this cake & was pleased with the outcome.

Dear Anamika from The Sugarcrafter presented me with another award. I take this oppurtunity to Thank her for her kind gesture. She is a very talented sugar artist & an inspirational blogger friend. I feel extremely happy to know that I make up her day :-)