Whoopie Pies, Three Yummy Flavors

Whoopie pies are everywhere! I even saw a box mix for them at the store last week. I wondered how long it would take Betty Crocker to catch on to this phenomenon that's been swirling around the DIY, crafty blog world.

Remember the rainbow of whoopie pies we baked as part of my son's Rainbow Balloon Birthday party?

My cousin, Becca, helped me put these together and after we had them all laid out, she stopped and said, "It looks like a stoplight!" Haha.

Each color represented a different yummy flavor: Red Velvet, Lemon Cream & Key Lime, but all were delicious! Everyone had a different favorite by the end of the day. It was a tough decision!

We tried to keep things as simple as possible on the baking front, so for the Red Velvet pies, we used a basic red velvet cake mix, and for the lemon ones, a lemon boxed cake mix. The Key Lime flavor was a little trickier, but allrecipes.com came to the rescue with this easily adaptable key lime cake recipe.

To make the signature shape, we filled cupcake tins about 1/4 full and baked for 8-10 min each. I highly suggest keeping an eye on your first batch because these can burn quickly and your oven may be a little different. Cool on a wire rack completely before frosting.

To create the eye-catching color, we used Wilton and Americana gel dyes. And, in the interest of keeping things simple, we relied on a few tubs of store-bought cream cheese frosting for the filling. Boxed cake mixes, store-bought frosting - and it couldn't have been yummier.

These are a simple treat that add a lot of color and whimsy to your buffet table. I have seen an incredible array of whoopie pie recipes floating around the blogosphere these days. What's your favorite take?

A Rainbow Balloon 3rd Birthday Party

My precious baby turned the big three years old recently and we threw him a big birthday bash. The theme was balloons but rainbow balloons are even more fun, so we combined the two.

A six layer R.O.Y.G.B.I.V. (minus the indigo) cake with cream cheese frosting. It was a big hit and tasted fantastic! The trick is using gel dyes instead of liquid. They make for very intense colors!
My son loves balloons. He can spot them from a mile away. But truth be told, I didn't think I had it in me to make a cake shaped like any of his favorite characters of the moment. So we went a little more abstract this time around. He still was thrilled with his cake and was absolutely head over heels when he discovered we had filled an entire room full of balloons. He had a blast plowing through them again and again.
Whoopie pies! Key lime, lemon, and red velvet all with cream cheese frosting. My son loved these and even skipped cake, instead saying, "I want a gween one, Mommy!" (I'll post directions for these soon but trust me, they are a piece of cake! Ugh, puns...)
Rainbow tissue poms added fun color and a festive backdrop. I couldn't believe I had never thought of those before! It's just your basic tissue pom, only with a variety of colors.

I'll have a tutorial soon for the candy filled train as well.
All of the food was served on white servings trays I have collected (on clearance, of course) over the years and we ate off of dollar store napkins and plates. Nothing too expensive or fancy, just fun and bright. It was the perfect evening celebrating our incredible blessing!

A lot of my inspiration came from Pinterest. Oh, Pinterest. Where have you been all my life? See the inspiration board for the party here. If you want to follow along with all the goodies I'm discovering on the web, you can follow me on Pinterest here.

Hope you're enjoying your last few weeks of summer!

Rainbow Cake

Summer is still in full swing over here but we've managed to fit in a party or two. I'll post more pictures later, but here's a sneak peek at the birthday bash we threw last weekend. It was an absolute blast!

Sometimes it happens...

Not all of my projects turn out well...
I had hopes that these would become miniature wedding cakes. Instead they turned into sad marshmallow-looking blobs. Anyone else had some baking fails lately?

Diamond Ring Cake

My husband's baby brother is getting married this month. I am so looking forward to watching those two lovebirds get hitched!

As we've been preparing for the big day, it has been so fun dreaming up wedding decorations and centerpieces for the rehearsal dinner. I'm looking forward to posting pictures of the wedding in all of its glory soon. Until then, I wanted to share an idea for a cake that I came up with as a surprise for the soon-to-be newlyweds on the day of their engagement.

Now, please be kind. All of these pictures were taken pre-blog, pre-cake decorating class, and pre-nice camera. I don't have detailed pictures because I wasn't preparing a tutorial at that time, but hopefully these pictures will give you a rough idea of how to recreate this cake on your own.

When I started dreaming up this cake, I wanted to create a cake that replicated the diamond solitaire look, but I refused to go purchase special cake pans. So I worked with what I had on hand. I started with a bundt pound cake and two 9-inch round butter cakes. I didn't push the work limit here, as you can see. It was all from mixes I had in my pantry and the icing came out of tubs (see below?).

Once you've baked the three cakes, before you go any further, stack your two butter cakes, spreading icing in between.


To create the shapes, I sketched the diamond shape onto a piece of paper, measuring so that it would not exceed the size of the round cakes, or overwhelm the bundt cake. Ordinarily, I'm of the belief that there's no such thing as a diamond that's too big, but in this case I had to make a concession.

I've created a paper template for you to use as a guide for the "diamond" portion of the cake. You can download it here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/31507430

Cut out the paper diamond template and arrange it on the bundt cake to your liking. Then, using a sharp knife, cut out the portion of the bundt cake where the diamond will rest inside. This will give the cake a more diamond "setting" look. Now place your template on the double layer butter cake. Cut around the template, using a sharp knife. Eat the scraps. (The how-to said so, so you've probably got no choice...)

NOTE: I chose not to level my two butter cakes because the curvature of the cake made it look more diamond-esque.

Using a large flat spatula, slide the double-layer "diamond" into the cut-out bundt cake. Icing is next. If you choose a light and dark color, be sure to ice the lighter one first, otherwise you'll end up dragging the dark color into your light icing and kick yourself. I chose cream cheese and chocolate so that the diamond portion would stand out better, and because it's what I had in my pantry. I'm sure you could go all Wilton-y and dye the color to look like an actual golden ring, if you wanted to. (If you do, please send me pictures! I'd love to see it!)

Learn from my mistake though. I got all excited and jumped right into this project without thinking about how I would store it. This is a BIG cake, and once it's iced, it's very difficult to move onto another platter. In my case, I made the cake the night before, and then had to hide it so it wouldn't spoil the surprise of the big proposal the next day.

My mom and I laughed and fought this cake for a while but finally came up with this:

Salad dressing bottles, lemon juice, soy sauce, marinades...anything that could hold plastic wrap high enough so it wouldn't fall into the icing. I stored this on the floor in my closet and I was terrified that my husband would come home that night, miss the hamper and demolish the cake with his dirty clothes.

It survived though. And the happy couple loved it...

The small diamond rings are made using engagement ring candy molds and candy melts I picked up at our local craft store.

This was a fun one to make! It would be super cute at a bridal shower. I would l-o-v-e to see pictures if any of you decide to make this!

Linky Partying with:

Today's Creative Blog

Creations by Kara

Sumo's Sweet Stuff

Let Them Decorate Cake, II

I actually have pictures this week to prove that I'm enrolled in a cake decorating class! (If you're just tuning in, I dropped a notebook right on top of the cake I decorated last week, so there were no pictures to show off!)
Happy Birthday to my mom! This cake isn't perfect, but I'm amazed that I created something out of frosting that even resembles a flower!

Let them decorate cake

If you've read my "about" page then you know that I've enrolled in a cake decorating class. It's something I've always wanted to do so my wonderful husband gave the class to me as a Christmas present. My mom says I've got the talent for it, but she's my adoring mom, so she can't be trusted on those matters.

My cakes taste good. And that's really all that matters for the most part. But the more years of cooking I get under my belt, the more I'd prefer my cakes not look like this:

My sagging, but delicious strawberry chocolate chip cake that's sitting on my kitchen counter right now

No complaints have risen so far, but wouldn't it be fun if it tasted great and looked pretty? I agree. Hence the cake decorating class.

Not all of my cakes are the baking equivalent of Debbie Downer (anybody else remember that SNL skit?).

Here is the cake from my son's first birthday party. You would not believe the collective sigh of relief by all the women in my kitchen when we realized that the duck was going to stand up on its own. It was a coin toss, I'll tell ya.


I love to bake. I like to think of it as my stress reliever. But I would also include wiping down surfaces with Lysol on that list as well, so I don't think that means too much.

Here is my very first from-scratch buttercream frosting. I laughed as I took this picture because it looked more like cookie dough. I'm working on that.

Helpful Tip: If you're wanting an ivory buttercream frosting, don't mess with food coloring or gels. Just use butter flavored shortening. In this picture, I had made a double batch, so I used half regular, half butter flavored. I liked the results!

Have you discovered the cake levelers out there lately? Sure beats using thread or a knife to split your cake.

No matter how hard I try, I can't keep my cakes from rounding out on the top. So they always endure a cake leveler beating. No matter...it's all covered with frosting in the end.

Do you fight your frosting? Because I do. I smooth it all out one way, only to have the other side of the cake look like a mountain range. This was the best I could do, using only my spatula. But get a hold of this great tip!...

Excuse the lighting. I was racing against nap time to get this finished before my class.

Helpful Tip: Iron your cake. Yep, you heard me. Using a fondant smoother (it looks like a thin, white plastic iron), iron your cake with light pressure, keeping a pattern-less paper towel in between your cake and the smoother. You can buy one at your local crafts store, but they look like this.


If you do that, your lumpy cake will become this:

I was so excited! Fondant is beyond me at this point, but I hope to learn how to better use it in the future. In the meantime, a good ol' buttercream will do the trick!

Let me know if you try this at home! I'd love to see pictures of your cakes!

PS - I would post pictures of my final decorated cake, but as I was cleaning up my work station, I dropped a notebook right on top of the cake. I hadn't even left the building yet. Only me. It was just one of those days, but it was good for a laugh!

I'm linking up to the following. I hope these ideas/tips help you as you're baking!