Omid and Armin's Birthday

Armin's 4th birthday cake. He requested a pirate ship cake for a pirate party at Chuck E. Cheese's.

Here's Omid's birthday cake this year. The filling was cookie's 'n cream and it was fantastic!

Busy Week #2, Done!

This is a cake I made for my friend Shannon's daughter who is turning 6. She is having a princess party and she needed a princess cake. I had planned on adding several more details to this cake, but time got away from me this week. I think it turned out lovely even without all the details. I think it looks so much prettier in person.

And I'm officially taking a cake break! Nothing scheduled until Omid and Armin's birthdays in May. But I'm planning some special cakes for them both. I can't wait!

3 cakes in 4 days. No problem, right?

Actually, right! Other than being busy and tired and well, tired, it went great! I was super proud of them all.

Cake #1, Jennifer asked me to make this for her husband's birthday. We had seen the design and loved it!

Cake #2: For my friend's lingerie party. I can't believe it turned out so well. It was my first time to carve a cake into a particular design (other than the football). It was my first time to do the cornelli lace pattern. I said I'd do a practice cake and this ended up being it! It came out great though.

And last, but certainly not least. For Jennifer's twins Ashlyn and Elizabeth's 5th birthday. They loved making their gingerbread houses at Christmas so much that they wanted a gingerbread house for their birthday. Well, we found the next best thing for two little princesses who needed to be indulged by some candy. A candy castle! This was my first tiered cake outside of class so I did A LOT of reading to make sure I knew just how to construct the tiers. And the castle towers. Well, that required a lot of constructing and planning too. I'll just say powertools were involved and its all good now and ready for future princesses (or princes) :-)

Pretty Serious Now

This cake was made for my dear friend Jennifer's son's 1st birthday. (Same friend with the twins). This cake definitely marks a point where I have realized how to plan for a cake. The baking, making the icing, and decorating all planned out. I still manage to screw up the cake board every time its a shaped pan. I do it backwards every single time. But other than that, I have it down pretty good. She picked the design, I said I could do it (not really sure I could), and it actually went fine. Much easier than I thought it would be.

This cake was for Jennifer's grandparent's anniversary. She didn't really ask for anything specific. Just a cake with light and dark blues. I came up with something simple that would have a bow on the top. The bow quite nearly became a disaster in assembling because my fondant ball was too hard. I didn't panic and just kept going and it came out fine I think. I will admit it looks better in the picture than I think it actually did in person. I had to cover up a boo-boo in the back. That whole icing color change thing again...

This was my redemption from the last baby shower cake I attempted. The picture was taken before the cute little baby accessories were added to it. So cute! I was really proud. It came out so much better than I expected. Well, it came out pretty darn near perfect. I'd like to perfect my writing now. I had everything well planned out again and did not stress out. I was never up too late and I was even able to watch 24 the night before the shower. So much better than how I started!

Getting more serious...

This was the final cake for my Intermediate class. First time I used fondant and I learned I LOVE working with the stuff. This was hands down the most fun I've ever had making a cake. I was actually dancing in class. I don't dance. :-) Now, if the stuff just weren't so darn expensive...

The first cake I actually made for someone other than me or a family member! Made for my dear friends' twin daughter's 4th birthday. There were cute lime green, purple, and pink cupcakes that went with it.

My pride and joy! I knew I would make this cake for over a year. For my son's 3rd birthday. I was quite proud. I had a little difficulty with the icing changing color in the purple as you can see in the picture, and also in the pink bear above. But, after a year of research and experiment, I think I've finally figured it out! I think I think I think. I'll know for sure soon enough!

Another cake I was very proud of. And the 2nd cake I officially did not make for myself or an immediate family member! Made this for Alia's High School graduation. I completely consider her my sister. So, I guess that does make her immediate family... Well, my brother was a little jealous that I did better on her cake that I did on his. What can I say? Skills improved. And I remember being SO thrilled that her colors were red, white, and blue because I had a TON of red left over from the Wiggles cake!!! It worked out perfectly! Red is not an easy color to make. Neither is this dark navy blue. I was pretty impressed.

How it all began...

I have to give my mom a lot of the credit because she made all of our birthday cakes growing up and dabbled in decorating as a hobby every now and again. My brother and I have an 11-year age difference and at some point I started to experiment and decided I wanted to make his birthday cake. I followed all the recipes and made a HUGE mess in my dad's tiny kitchen, but I got it done. Wish I could find the pic for that. Not bad for a beginner. Made about 5 different colors for my first cake. I stayed up all night into the wee hours of the morning making that cake and it was the best thing I ever did.

I had always looked in books and sort of built up a collection over the years, but never really did anything until I had my own child in 2005. Then I started taking things serious and decided for his 1st birthday I wanted to make his cake. The bear cake is completely self-taught. I spent hours reading about how to do a 3-d cake and how the cake needs to be firm or it will collapse. As I look back now, I'm pretty proud of that cake. It taught me a lot. And I enjoyed every minute.

Still dilly dallying with the canned icing. Why make your own if you don't have to? For this cake I didn't find it necessary to go through the ordeal of making chocolate icing. I free-handed the logos for the superbowl teams since the superbowl fell on my dad's birthday that year. I carved the football shapes out of 2 9x13 cakes. Again, a ton of reading on this one. I am not an artist, but I've been impressed with what I can do with icing. Get me to do that same thing on paper and I promise you it won't happen. This was rare for me to be a little creative.

Still self-taught for my son's 2nd birthday. The theme was Tigger and Pooh so I was set to have a Tigger AND a Pooh cake. I will say this was the last year we had his birthday at home. I wanted to be able to focus on the cake for his birthday and not on all the other things that go into having a birthday at home. Of course, if I do these cakes again today, I doubt it would take me close to as long as it took me then. I was up well past what I had expected with these cakes, the night before the party.

Disaster Story: At work we were having a baby shower for a friend of ours, Catherine. She was expecting a baby girl and I volunteered to make the cake. This was in the Spring of 2007. The cake we had picked was adorable. 4 baby blocks. Well, long story short, it didn't quite turn out so well. I was nothing short of absolutely devastated. I will say, however, that no one agreed with me. But, I refused to take a picture (regret that now), and I couldn't even be present for the shower to see it. After that experience I immediately enrolled in cake decorating classes at a bakery in Plano. Suprisingly enough, I didn't learn a whole lot in the first course, but I learned a ton in course II and in couse III the next year.

This would be the first cake I made while enrolled in course I, for my brother's HS graduation.

Cakes by Shirin, First Blog!

Well, I decided to start a blog, separate from my personal family blog, dedicated to the cakes I make for various special occassions. I'm happy to have all of my cake pictures in one place. Beware! You might read more than you ever wanted to know about cake!