Football Cake Pops

The saga of the cake pops continues.  This time, I got fancy and made some to look like footballs.  They are blobby footballs, but still footballs.  I hope they make the perfect treat for the Superbowl tomorrow.

To make these, I shaped the cake into a ball like normal but then pinched the ends to give them a more football-like shape.  (For instructions on how to make cake pops, see this post).

In order to not get a chocolate foot, my husband rigged up a cardboard drying stand.  Basically, it's a skinny cardboard box with holes punched in it.  This allowed the pops to dry standing up and helped retain the cake shape.  Most of them held up, some did not.

Finally, I used icing to draw lines on the footballs.  This particular icing suggested heating it in the microwave.  I suggest not doing this; it made it way too runny and I had to wait for it to cool off.

That's it!  I made red velvet cake this time and used cream cheese frosting.  Yum!

Cake Pops Revisited

In my quest to make the perfect cake pop, it's necessary that I make them all the time for every occasion possible (and of course I have to eat several from each batch).  Last time, I had lots of problems with the chocolate.  To correct this, this time I used candy melts rather than baker's chocolate.

I found this MUCH easier to work with.  I also rigged up a double boiler to melt the chocolate more slowly and I think this also made a big difference.  The chocolate was much smoother and I had no problems with burning. [ I realize I just referred to the candy melts as chocolate.  They're not really; I used vanilla flavored melts]

I still would like to find a way to get less of a chocolate foot on the bottom, but overall I think these turned out prettier and more consistent than before.

Cake Pop Learning Experience

I was really excited to make some chocolate-covered strawberry cake pops.  However, I wasn't thinking and put all the cake directly into my icing bowl rather than adding icing in slowly.  The result?  A soggy mess.  Too sweet and too wet to be a good cake pop.  I'm disappointed, but I will use this as a learning experience.  I will try again this weekend and show you the (hopefully) awesome results.

What learning experiences have you had while baking or crafting?

Wedding Season

After my wedding jewelry project this week, I started to think that there might be lots of couples out there gathering wedding inspiration.  I was doing that very thing last year about this time; my wedding was August of last year so all summer I was busy searching out inspiration.  If only I had pinterest at that time.  sigh...

Anyway, I thought I would share some of the pictures from our wedding to help give inspiration to all of you planning out there.  Our colors were orange and blue and we were not too formal about it all.  Enjoy!

First, the flowers.  I wanted something bright because that's just the kind of girl I am.  Lilies are my favorite flower and the first flowers Eugene ever gave me were orange lilies, so that was the starting point.  Other than that, we told the florist to just make a mix, almost like a fresh picked bouquet.  Our decor was a mix of vintage bottles filled with flowers.

Next is the cake.  I don't have a lot to say about this, but I was really pleased with the results.

Here are some pics of our style.  I chose simple dresses for the bridesmaids.  I won't lie and say they could wear them again (I've been a bridesmaid 7 times-you don't wear them again).  I made the necklaces for my bridesmaids and bought them each a different pair of earrings.  The necklaces had orange and blue glass beads with navy blue ribbon on either end to tie them closed.  Sadly, you can't see the jewelry all that well in this picture and I forgot to take close-ups.

For my hair piece, I got a beautiful feather piece off of etsy.  Loved it!  I debated between flowers and feathers, but feathers won out.  You can mainly see the white feathers in this photo, but there was one little peacock feather stuck in there as well.  I tried to link it to the shop but it looks like the shop is closed :( 

For wedding favors, we went with bubble gum.  I spit gum in Eugene's face on the night he asked me out so it seemed appropriate.  We used orange gum and printed up little story cards telling the tale.

Okay.  That's all for now.  I'm feeling lazy so I didn't look up all of the vendors info, but if you are in Seattle and loved something you saw, just ask and I will hook you up.  We were VERY happy with everyone we chose.


All photos by Red Box Pictures.  Amazing.  Hire these guys.  Totally worth the money.

Fiesta!

Pinata Picture Source

Last night we had a fiesta-themed birthday party for me.  Complete with tacos and pinata (poor little pinata).  Friends, food, fun.

With no where to hang him, we used a paint roller extension pole, held by my husband.

My sweetie pie husband continued the trend of animal birthday cakes and made me a sea otter cake.

The sea otter is holding a shell and swimming through a rocky cove.

 My friend Kim gave me a fantastic bird business card holder.  It will be perfect for my upcoming show!!

And finally, in keeping with this theme, here is an etsy treasury inspired by the event.  And special bonus, every item on here was posted by the EtsyBloggers Team.  Enjoy!