Bumble Bee Baby Shower

This past weekend I was buzzing around like a busy bee in my kitchen. My good friend Kelly who I have mentioned here on CIS before was hosting a baby shower, instead of being the guest of honor herself as you may remember here. The theme was bumble bees, adorable! I had never decorated anything with the bee theme before so immediately I started envisioning yellow & black, polka dots and of course little bees everywhere. Kelly requested cupcakes and cake balls/pops and then some sugar cookie onesies and baby bottles for the favors.

Drawing inspiration from polka dot ribbon and cupcake liners I added some dots to the yellow onesie cookies. My first instinct was to decorate the cookies with black stripes so they would more closely resemble a bee, but after trying this on one cookie it quickly reminded me too much of Charlie Brown...so I scratched that idea and proceeded with polka dots.

I hope you enjoy all the pictures of the bumble bee sweets...I got a little carried away BEE cause everything was so cute! I have some exciting news at the bottom of the post too that I can't wait to share with you!

The bee cupcake toppers were made from yellow fondant rolled into an oval with two slivered almonds poked into the sides. The stripes and eyes were piped on using black royal icing. I used a round tip 1A to pipe on 4 swirls of icing to resemble a bee hive.

Bumble bee cake pops inspired by Bakerella.

Now for the EXCITING NEWS!!!

I am going to be a monthly blog contributor to Half Baked. If you have never heard of Half Baked before and you are as big of a cake lover as me...well I don't know where you have been! Half Baked is seriously my go to blog for cake inspiration! It is filled with some of the most gorgeous and unique cakes I have ever seen. Carrie, the founder and editor of Half Baked is a cake designer herself and also features some of the most talented cake vendors in the industry. Whether a cake for a birthday, shower or wedding, no matter the occasion I am always blown away by the creative cakes and decorating techniques seen on Half Baked! This blog is truly one of my all time favorites, and one I have been following for almost two years now. I am so honored that Carrie has chosen me to be part of her blog. My new gig will involve creating monthly cupcake recipes and photos to share with all her readers, and I can't wait! I am looking forward to sharing my first cupcake flavor later this month, so stayed tuned!

Have a great week!

Spring Cake Pops

Happy Monday! Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend. Mine sure was jam packed will all sorts of fun stuff...starting with a 12 mile run at 5AM Saturday, followed by some cake baking (it was my attempt at this insanely rich and calorie packed cake), and then a crawfish boil couple's shower! Sunday we got on the road bright and early and headed to New Orleans for the day to see our nephew play soccer. While we were there we checked out a local sweet boutique, Sucre that was recommended by a friend. Can't wait to share some pics of those amazing desserts as well! So basically I've been on the go go go and this week only gets crazier!

I have meetings, last minute planning for the Bunny Chase 5K event I coordinate every year, a final consultation with the bride for this wedding cake, my family is coming in town on Thursday for Easter weekend and there is lots of cleaning to do before my mom comes to give my house the white glove test! So to hold you over for a little while, I'll leave you with a few photos of the Spring themed cake pops I made last week for some Bunco parties!

Go grab some yellow candy melts or any color for that matter, a jar of sprinkles and start dipping those cake balls!

Wouldn't these make the cutest addition to your Easter baskets this year!

Nike Shorts Inspired Cake Pops

I love finding inspiration for my baking endeavors in things around me everyday. Let's just say this wall of Nike shorts featured at our local Mobile outdoor store, McCoy Outdoor Co. is a runner's dream! One of my favorite pieces of clothing is Nike Shorts...I think I own the entire rainbow of colors as part of my running ensemble and tend to wear a pair almost daily. This store is always stocked full with a wide variety of shorts in the latest seasonal colors. And if you've been a long time follower of my blog then you know running marathons and the non-profit organization Team in Training are two of my greatest passions. Well last week McCoy Outdoor and Team in Training paired up to host a Ladies Night featuring local vendors! Since McCoy's is well known for their wall of Nike shorts, I thought it would be a fun treat to make some "Nike shorts" inspired cake pops courtesy of Crave. Indulge. Satisfy.

Oh the color combination of candy melts and sprinkles you can use to create this array of colors! So if you saw last week's post about candy melts, well here the secret has been revealed!

I think my favorite turned out to be the blue with the pink sprinkles! Hmmm now that I think about it I don't think I own this color combo of shorts either!

In case you are wondering, the cake inside was red velvet with cream cheese frosting. They were good, ok AMAZING...I may have sampled 1 or 2 or 3 before I took them to Ladies Night!

In addition to providing cake pops for the event, I was also promoting my new product, a runner's memorabilia book, RACEDAY. This is the perfect solution for all you runner's out there that like to keep your race bib#s, course maps, photos and statistics for all your 5K, 10K, half marathons and marathons. Much to my surprise, this morning I woke up to find that RACEDAY had been featured on Hadley Designs. Hadley is the amazing artist and graphic designer who designed the RACEDAY logo and helped bring my vision for this product to life. So rather than me go on and on about the product, go check out the details on Hadley's site and be sure to stay there a while and look at all of her amazing design work and design inspiration. I came across Hadley's website over 2 years ago when I was searching online for a local freelance designer. I was immediately drawn in by the design of her website and her portfolio and knew that her style was exactly what I was envisioning for my product. Hadley and I instantly meshed well together and had a blast designing the book. I am so pleased with how the final piece turned out and look forward to working with Hadley on more design projects in the future! Not only does Hadley do logo designs, she creates custom invitations and stationery, websites and even illustrates. She truly is the entire package when it comes to creativity! So go check out Hadley's blog and website and be sure to enter her giveaway for some Free Personalized Stationery while you're there! You better hurry because the deadline to enter is tomorrow!

Now back to the Nike shorts...I am loving some of these new colors and think I need to go grab a few more pairs to add to my wardrobe! I'll take a pair in orange and a pair in purple please!

So that's my story on Nike Shorts, cake pops and RACEDAY. I'd love for you to go check out RACEDAY on Facebook and become a fan!

In the works...

Here's a sneak peak at what's going on behind the scenes in my kitchen this week. Rainbow colored Candy Melts...can someone say Cake Pops!

Silver dragees and black fondant flowers to create a beautiful cupcake design for a wedding this weekend!

Let's just say there is lots of red velvet cake baking in the very near future to accompany all of these fun decorations!

Check back soon for pictures of the final sweets!