Dr. Seuss Cupcake Toppers

I get asked quite often if I make cupcakes or cakes for sale.  As of right now I do not because of lack of freezer space (which is needed to make super nice looking cakes) However I am super excited to tall you all that as of the end of Nov. the hubby and I will be moving into our first house!!!! Which means cakes may be in the future for Something Sweet.

Until then I have a great alternative for those of you who want cupcakes and Something Sweet from me.

Cupcake Toppers! You provide the cupcakes and I provide the decorations.

These toppers were for a sweet little boys birthday who happened to love Dr. Seuss

The Birthday Boy was very well read and loved several Dr. Seuss books which gave me a lot of inspiration to draw from. 

Of course there had to be Cat in the Hat and Green Eggs and Ham.  I decided to add the Lorax one of my favorites and One Fish Two Fish because of the fun illustrations.  

Stay Sweet Everyone!

Antique 1st Birthday

By now most of you know my favorite orders are..... I would like some cookies, for this event, decorate them as you please.

It gives me a chance to try out a bunch of different techniques that I haven't had a chance to try on other cookies.

This next set was exactly that.  I got to play around with gumpaste, stenciling with icing, and adding cool texture to cookies with sprinkles and then airbrushing over it.

Hope you enjoy the cookies in all their Antique themed glory!

Stay Sweet Everyone ^^

Swimming themed Grad cookies

It's graduation season, which means lots of fun cookies in school colors.  This next set is one I hold near and dear to my heart because not only did I get to make them for a Mankao West graduate (my alma mater) but they were swimming themed cookies as well which is one of the many activities I took part in while attending West. 

It was fun to think up different color and design combos for these lovely ladies.  

However I do have to say these were some of the most difficult cookies to work with.  From time time to time I have a client provide me with a special cookie cutter that they want me to use.  I will gladly do it too, but this cutter was a doozy.

Small shapes at sharp angles make for a cookie that doesn't release well from the cutter, and to top it all off the cutter had guide lines built into it to distinguish the different parts of the cookie. 

These guide lines in theory are great, they keep each cookie looking the same as far as swimsuit and cap placement.  However in reality they are a nightmare, the guides were set so low in the cutter that I couldn't make the cookie very thick or the whole thing would have fallen apart.  

After baking the cookies were equally as fragile because of how deep the guide lines cut into the cookie. It's a good thing I made a few extra cookies because these poor girls kept loosing their heads.  

Had the cutter been one of mine I would have cut the guide lines out.  If you are ever having issues with a cutter it is always a safe bet to remove sharp angles form the cutter by bending it a bit and remove those guide lines.  While they make decorating easier (in some cases) it's not worth worrying about the structural integrity of your cookie.  

After all the girls were decorated I was still a bit worried about a few breaking.  The last thing I want to do is give a client a bunch of broken cookies.  To hopefully make up for any broken cookies (once they were put on display...it happens) I made this lovely focal cookie.  The flags read Congrats Ally and the starting blocks display the graduation year.  

Here is a closer look at the little swimmers ready to start off their blocks.  I am so happy with how this one turned out.  Plus how cute is that crowd of cheering people.  I will for sure be revisiting this cookie design in the future.  

Congrats to all you grads out there!!!

Stay sweet everyone :D

Mankato Ballet Company Alice in Wonderland

http://www.mankatoballet.org/

For those of you in the Mankato area and looking for something to do this weekend, go and check out the Mankato Ballet Companies performance of Alice in Wonderland.  I hear it is going to be magical!

I love making cookies for local businesses, even better is making fun Alice in Wonderland cookies for a local business. 

It was fun trying to incorporate the poster design in to a mini cookie.  All in all I am pleased with how these turned out. 

Let's be honest here the first thing that probably comes to your mind when you think of Ballet is pink and point shoes.  I thought it was appropriate to add both to a few of the Alice cookies. 

Hope you all enjoy the Ballet if you decide to go this weekend.  If you missed it above here is the link to the Mankato Ballet Companies site so you can get all the information you need if you plan to attend this weekend. 

Stay Sweet Everyone!

Nautical themed wedding cookies, and Gum Paste Tutorial

There are people in this life that do nothing but spread happiness to others, they walk into a room and light it up with their smile and positive attitude.

Keith and Amy are two of those people in this life and I am so happy that they found each other.

I was thrilled to make some wedding cookies for the two of them and share a bit of my love with them during this amazing journey in their lives.  The two of them are getting married soon in the tropics thus the beach theme of the cookies.

 This set gave me the opportunity to use a new technique, Gum Paste!  I used ModPodg molds to make all the different shells and then airbrushed, petal dusted and hand painted the dried results.

Making GumPaste decorations is now my new favorite thing to do in the evening, it's quick and easy and I can do it while watching TV or chatting with the hubby. 

I was so surprised how easy it was to make these little decorations.  All you have to do is buy some powdered gum paste and follow the directions to mix up the gum paste, then you can work with it straight away or keep it in the freezer for later use.  

Once your GumPaste is mixed and kneaded I make small pea sized balls and push them into the molds.  I let the GumPaste sit in the mold for a few min. before popping it out.  Any silicone mold will work just be sure to wash it before use and dusting it with powdered sugar helps keep the GumPaste from sticking.  

Once the GumPaste pieces are removed form the mold I use and exacto knife to cut off any of the scraggly bits and smooth up the edges.  Be sure to do this before the GumPaste dries otherwise you will be hacking away and the edges the next day and may end up breaking your lovely pieces you just made.

I let all the decorations air dry for about 3 days and then store them in a small tupperware.  Be sure to let the pieces dry out before sealing them away or they could cause already dried pieces to melt.  Same goes for painting your decorations, if you are not applying them to a cookie right away let them dry for a day or so before sealing them up with other decorations.  

Comment or e-mail if you are interested in a full tutorial on making GumPaste decorations.  I would be more than happy to make a photo tutorial or even a video if their is interest in it.  

Stay Sweet Everyone and Congrats Amy and Keith <3

Corporate Marketing Cookies

More often than not I am making cookies for baby showers or birthdays, however every now and then it is fun to switch things up.  

I made these cookies for a local caterer in town to help them advertise to local businesses.  

If you have a business you want to market your services to, or you are hosting a corporate event be sure to hit me up.  I would love to make you some cookies with your business logo on them.

If you are in the Mankato area and want to check out some of these local businesses you can find them out at the links provided below.  

And if you are in the area and want some amazing food catered for your next event be sure to place an order from Najwa's Catering!

Stay Sweet Everyone!

http://www.mtuonsiteenergy.com/home/

http://www.hilltopflorist.com/

http://www.bruntonarchitects.com/

http://www.cbfg.net/

Chevron Baby Shower Cookies

How sweet is the name Oliver Watson K,  it just warms your heart, and if you could see the little guy your heart would be even warmer, he is a cutie!

This is one of those sets that got me really excited because I finally had a chance to make a chalkboard cookie......and I got to use my super cool new contraption for tracing difficult designs (more about that in a later post)

When I was commissioned for the set I was asked to make cookies to match with a chevron, chalkboard and teal themed baby shower highlighting the baby's name.  From there I had creative freedom to come up with whatever I wanted.

I opted to airbrush a few chevron cookies, do a K cookie to match a beautiful metallic K they displayed at the baby shower and the highlight of the whole set was a chalkboard cookie that matched the birth announcements.

This set allowed me to use a few techniques that I normally don't get to try out, like making my own K transfers and using (non homemade) stencils to airbrush patterns on a cookie.  

My all time favorite cookie of this set was the chalkboard cookie.  I was really excited about this one not only because I had the chance to finally make a chalkboard cookie but I also go the chance to use my Camera-Lucida app on my tablet and the new cool holder my hubby made for me so I could finally use the app.  I will do a nice write up about Camera-Lucida and how to make a stand for it some time soon.  For those of you like me who don't have a kopycake it is a great way to keep things consistent on cookies.  If you are itching to know more go and check Klickitat street for an awesome tutorial.  

Stay sweet everyone!

Funky Sock Cookies

I can't even begin to tell you all how excited I was to get this order.  I love funky socks!  When I go to Korea one of the first things on my list (besides eating lots of Korean food) is to buy crazy Korean socks.

When this order came in for a set of crazy sock cookies for a surprise 18th birthday I was thrilled!

The birthday boys mom sent me photos of some of his favorite funky socks and I replicated them in cookie form.

Hope you all get as big of a kick out of these cookies as I did.

Stay sweet everyone!