The plane, the plane!

The following post is somewhat overdue. My blog advertises that it is a journey of motherhood, cakes, and procrastination. Let's just say the first and third got in the way of blogging about the second. But I must not forget the roots of this blog, and that is to shamelessly flaunt my bi-yearly cake creations. This year P asked for a, oh gosh I've already forgotten the name of the plane. Something P something Mustang. P 51 Mustang. Thank you search history. Anyway, he's very much into all things war and weaponry, so I wasn't all that surprised when he requested a fighter plane. The design was relatively simple, although I was told afterward that the wings were supposed to be straight out, not at an angle, which I honestly only altered to make the cake fit on the tray. Ah well, lesson learned. Fit matters not; follow the pictures.

After nine years of cake building, the process has become rather streamlined. This year I went with a confetti batter and made a batch of rice krispie treats because they are super easy to mold into whatever shape you need. The key is to mold when the treats are warm and to do so on a well-buttered surface wearing plastic gloves sprayed with cooking spray. For the cake, I used a large loaf pan for the body and two small loaf pans for the cockpit, nose and rear wing (tail?). 

Frosting is no longer my nemesis. I make a batch of traditional buttercream frosting (room temperature butter, confectioner's sugar, and milk - I use soy) and stir in about half a container of cool whip. The cool whip creates a smooth consistency and allows for frosting along cut edges. Back when I made the tie fighter, I learned the trick to gray: black food coloring with a dash of blue. It looked too purple at first and I was a bit worried, but when it cooled the color was beautiful. 

I kept the decorations simple. Red coin candies flipped upside down, thick black licorice for the propellers and guns, and blue sprinkle sky with marshmallow clouds. P created additional guns with the candles.

 

Other than the misdirected wings, the cake turned out nicely, and I spent much less time obsessing about it this year. Which makes the husband happy. And the boy is clearly pleased. Which makes mama happy.

Now we just need to stop procrastinating and get the thank you notes done.

The power of persuasion... or perhaps magic

After several rounds of, "Are you sure you don't want mommy to make you a special cake? Are you sure you just want a square cake?" my boy offered a suggestion: The Magic Tree House. Duh. Why hadn't I thought of that? He loves the books and wants to read them all so that he can have his name on the school library "tree house". We are on #17 and have a looooong way to go, because many of the books come with a fact tracker that teaches you all about the time period and place that Jack and Annie visit. And my boy loves him some facts.

When he made the suggestion, I went to the wonderful world of Google images to see what other moms had done. I am not on Pinterest (believing it will only make me feel inadequate), and I do not steal ideas from other people, but I do look to the Internet to get my creative juices flowing. And flow they did. There was one cake, clearly made by a professional, that was three dimensional - a tree house supported by a trunk and decorated with cute little books at the base. Amazing. But I had no idea how to support the weight of the cake. Part of my philosophy is that the entire thing must be edible, and it seemed I would need to use cardboard to distribute the weight. Another picture featured a ridiculous amount of fondant (which I never use) and explained that the tree was a vase covered in fondant. Vases are certainly not edible.

Lying in bed one night (Husband: "I do not want to talk about the cake. This is your thing.") I thought, why wouldn't I just lay it flat? Why does it need to be three dimensional? There is no way we'd be able to transport that! Again, duh. So I set off to the drawing board. Translation: wandering the bulk food aisle with rough sketch in hand. The trunk is fashioned out of rice krispie treats, because why not. At the time I was still trying to figure out how to make the tree stand up, and I remembered seeing Cake Boss use that technique. Of course he wrapped the treats around a PVC pipe for stability, but remember - all must be edible! I molded the mixture into a trunk shape, let it cool, and then covered it with melted chocolate, using a knife to make tree-like swirls. The cake itself is a simple chocolate cake cooked in two loaf pans. I thought I would stack them, but when they came out of the oven I realized I should have just used a square pan. Because low and behold, two loaf pans = one square pan. Oops. But it looked better with just one, so I saved the other loaf for "extra". My frosting was a masterpiece with no disasters this year! (Finally, right?) I added cocoa powder to make it brown and swirled in cool whip for ease of spread-ability, thinking to myself that I should totally patent this recipe. The rope ladder is laffy taffy and wafer cookies - I had originally planned to use licorice rope, but when the bulk food lady told me they didn't have it I turned around in a huff and found the laffy taffy. The chocolate wafer cookies had to be cut into smaller pieces to simulate the boards, and I also sliced the gummy leaves in half because their weight caused them to slip off the side of the cake.

All in all, I am pleased with the result. I tried to think of a way to create Jack and Annie but just didn't think I could pull off tiny humans. And there are no cute fondant books, but hopefully the kids will get the idea. I honestly have no idea how we are going to cut into the rice krispie trunk without making a complete mess. Oh, and if some kid doesn't like chocolate, they are out of luck. It will be J's first friend party and we invited his entire Kindergarten class, most of whom RSVP'd yes. Should be interesting.

Anyway, thanks for reading - here's the finished product:

From monster truck to, "Just make me a square"

My youngest knows how to push my buttons. To quote him exactly, "And your zippers too." And he knows how much I get into the annual cake making extravaganza. So this year, when he announced that he just wants me to make him a square cake, I wasn't entirely surprised. But I was a little heart broken. His birthday party is next week. It's his first friend party and I am excited to have the chance to show off my mad cake making skills to a new set of parents. Nope. Just a square. No fancy design, no elaborate concoction made from the various treats in the bulk food aisle, nothing.

I have a week to change his mind.

Last year, he was very much into monster trucks. We read about them, talked about them, played with them. Having some prior vehicle experience from oldest's bulldozer, I knew roughly what needed to be done. The boy loves chocolate, so I made a chocolate cake in two loaf pans and arranged the pieces to resemble a truck.

Then I used the miracle frosting (which no longer exists) to make it blue. The inspiration was Big Foot, and despite using the largest possible chocolate donuts for the wheels, they still were not quite big enough. According to boy expert anyway. I used fudge cookies for windows and the about to be crushed cars, and chocolate graham crackers for the dirt. To make the truck look tough, I raided the leftover Halloween candy and found a bag of skull and bones. (Yes, we still had Halloween candy in June.) Perfect. Some fruit roll ups for stripes, weird little wafer things for headlights, and Twizzlers for tail lights. The truck was epic. EPIC.

Which is why I don't get it. Why would he not want me to make him a specialty cake this year? Should I simply override his wishes and chose a design for him? That seems a bit underhanded, but I just don't think I can arrive at his party with a boring square cake.

What's a mom to do?

Enter the Creeper

This year's birthday cake was a no-brainer. The boys are obsessed with Minecraft. They play it every chance they get, odd elevator music emanating throughout the house. P eagerly devours strategy books and talks non stop about things that go right over my head. I was on board with the Star Wars obsession - I learned the character names and could appreciate the story lines. Minecraft? Despite the obvious learning aspects of building things and tapping into the creative parts of the brain and all that, it is mind numbingly boring. Maybe it's a kid thing. I don't know. Needless to say, when P's birthday approached and I asked the yearly question, "What will the cake be this year?" and he said, "A creeper" I didn't even bat an eye. Minecraft is all squares. Easy peasy. No complicated, two cake design this year. No strange colors or multiple trips to the bulk food candy section. One square, some green food coloring, and ta-da!

If only it were that simple. The amazing frosting that I discovered two years ago? It has been discontinued. There was much shaking of fists and gnashing of teeth in the frozen food aisle and on the family room couch after subsequent smart phone searches. No more cool whip frosting.

*DEAR KRAFT FOODS, IF YOU SENT THE DATA MINING HOUNDS AFTER ME AND DISCOVERED THIS BLOG, PLEASE BRING BACK THE COOL WHIP FROSTING, THANKS A BUNCH.*

Once I calmed down and realized I would have to go back to (gulp) making my own frosting, I searched for a decent vegan recipe. The boy can't tolerate dairy, so I figured if there was no cool whip frosting I might as well make something he can eat without gassing out the entire room. The recipe called for dairy free margarine, confectioner's sugar, and coconut milk. I followed the directions. Seriously. Every step. And my frosting looked like this:

Look familiar to any moms and dads out there? Like the stuff that comes out of your kid when they aren't capable of digestion? I'm guessing the margarine started to separate or something horrid like that. But it tasted okay, so I slapped it onto the inner layers and set out to make frosting batch number two.

A good little scientist, I altered one of the factors, swapping the margarine for butter (olfactories be damned!) and came out with something with a slightly better consistency but still paling in comparison to the creaminess of the cool whip frosting. That and the color was just not right.

Face in the fridge. Ah-ha! A nearly empty container of cool whip. I scraped batch number two off the cake, folded in the cool whip and added a few drops of neon green. Ta-da! Batch number three a success.

*DEAR KRAFT FOODS, NEVER MIND. I FIGURED IT OUT WITHOUT YOU. PLEASE KEEP MAKING COOL WHIP AND I WILL JUST MAKE MY OWN DANG FROSTING. THANKS FOR NOTHING. OKAY, THANKS FOR THE COOL WHIP.*

Meanwhile, the husband helped out by cutting rip rolls into squares to resemble the pixels in the video game. Remember rip rolls from last year's minion? A fabulous find. This year I was pleased to find two different shades of green, a gift from the cake fairies. For the face, I used fudge cookies, which are not quite square shaped or black, but close enough to create the desired effect.

The boy was pleased. Always the litmus test. Does the cake actually resemble the desired thing? Yes? Success.

The Making of a Minion

P's birthday cake was a screaming success! And seeing as it was completed with no drama this year, I have decided instead to post a how-to and share some of my divine secrets. (Also, someone asked.) 

J and I have been doing cooking lessons on Fridays, and we used last week's time to bake the cakes. He enjoyed helping with the measuring, timing the mixing, and of course licking the spatula at the end. To ensure a clean removal, I lined the bottom of the pans with waxed paper and gave the sides a quick grease with cooking spray. I used an 8 inch circle pan (purchased for the famous drum set cake) and an 8 inch square pan, and used the leftover batter for cupcakes. Once the cakes were cooled, I cut the circle one in half and gouged out two places for the eyes.

The eyes were two cupcakes, frosted and decorated with silver sprinkles around the edge. I frosted first, then placed into the head, which was a little tricky, but I was worried about getting the sprinkles all over. Two generic M&Ms were placed in the center. The square cake was used for the minion's body, and I used wafer cookies for arms and legs. He looked a little freaky, but here's the assembly pre-frosting.

 The round cake had risen a bit in the center, causing it to be uneven with the square cake. (Anyone who knows how to fix this in the future, please comment!) I used the pieces from the eye sockets to fill in the gaps and covered everything with what I like to call "miracle frosting". It is made from cool whip and kept in the freezer until a few hours before you are ready to use it. In the past I made my own with confectioner's sugar, but it always made a mess if there were any loose crumbs. The cool whip frosting just covers it all up. Amazing. And delicious too! You have to keep it in the fridge, and it does harden a bit, but that's fine by me! Here's the minion, mid-frost. I used thick black licorice for the gloves.

 Once he was frosted, I used thin black licorice for the hair, goggle straps, and smile. I wanted to do the overalls in blue fruit roll ups, but couldn't find any. Discouraged and mumbling to myself in the cereal aisle last week, I turned around and spotted a display with Rip Rolls. They are thin strips of fruit roll candy covered in sugar and taste a bit like sour patch kids. The color was perfect, but they made an enormous sticky sugary mess all over the counter. The buttons on his overalls are M&Ms and his feet are ho-hos. Which I sampled while building and was disappointed to discover that they just don't taste as good as they did when I was a kid. The "G" is done in black icing.

 Overall, I was very pleased with how the cake turned out. I decorated it on Friday night for an early party on Saturday. The only fix needed was extra frosting on the arms because the top layer of wafer cookie had separated. The boy was happy, and his friends and their parents were impressed. One dad said he thought it was professionally done. (*Blush*) And of course everyone wanted to eat the sticky "blue stuff".

The CAKE

It is that time of year. Cake time. P's birthday is next week, and he is having his friend party this weekend. We have decided on a minion cake this year; Dave the minion to be exact. For those readers who are new to my world of cake insanity, welcome. Prepare to be amazed. But please, please don't ask me if I use pinterest. Or tell me to "Just go buy a cake." Or use fondant. Because those things are ALL AGAINST THE RULES. Here's a little story to get the newbies up to date.

Once upon a time there was an ordinary mom whose son was turning two. The adorable little boy was obsessed with one red, fuzzy Sesame Street character, and his mother wanted to make him a cake in that character's likeness. The ordinary mom had a snarky older sister who said, "You? Make a cake? It can't be done!" (Cue evil cackling.) (Insert heartfelt apology to big sister - it's for dramatic effect, okay sissy?) Ordinary mom thought, "How hard can it be?" and set off to make a wonderful and amazing Elmo cake. It awed. It impressed. It gave ordinary mom a warm fuzzy feeling inside.

And started a revolution.

The next year, a team of experts  were flown in to consult on the bulldozer cake (okay, it was just my friend Amy and she drove, but she had some amazing ideas). When the boy turned four, and asked for a drum set, the seemingly insurmountable task was accomplished in record breaking temperatures with several frosting related disasters. Really, it was. Then there were two boys and twice the fun with cake planning, weeks of obsessive behavior that isolated ordinary mom from the rest of the family, and of course the warm, fuzzy accolades and "Thank you mom"s that made it all worth while. (Check the April and June sections of my blog if you wish to read the specific story of each cake.)

Each year, the ordinary mom laughs in the face of those who tell her to buy a cake or wander through the evil site where other people's ideas make one feel inferior. Then she marches to the bulk food aisle in the grocery store and lets her imagination travel to a world filled with candied confections that will become THE CAKE. Here are some of this year's chosen treats.

Stay tuned to find out the exciting conclusion!

A Superhero Birthday

During the weeks leading up to John's birthday, he insisted he wanted a Tyrannosaurus Rex cake for his birthday. I kept hoping he would change his mind considering I had no idea how I was going to pull that off. Finally I decided to consult my colleagues and search the wonderful world of google images. There were a few reasonable ideas, but they involved a lot of cake and way more prep than I desired. I went home that night and asked him if he really, truly wanted a T-Rex cake and he replied that no, he wanted Iron Man instead. Iron Man??? We've never seen the movies, never read any books about him and have no Iron Man toys. Apparently his friends at school suggested it and suddenly it was what he HAD TO HAVE. I sighed, went back to google and searched for Iron Man cakes. The two major problems? Red and gold. Red is a very tricky frosting color and gold? Well, it took me a long time to make the gold thingy for Paul's Green Ninja and it ended up looking a bit like a jock strap. I wasn't about to go through that again. So I surfed around for superhero cakes and stumbled upon The Hulk. The suggestion was met with instant approval and it turned out to be a relatively easy cake. My only regret is that I didn't make the fists fist-like and they looked more like paws. My husband pointed this out AFTER I had already molded and frosted them. He told me he "didn't want to intervene." For future reference dear: suggestions are always welcome.

 The green frosting turned out well (much better than red would have!!) but I ended up wearing much of it on my hands along with some black that leaked out of the lid. oops.

Overall I was pleased, as was the boy. He was happy I had sent him to school with green frosted cupcakes on his birthday, but he liked the "real Hulk smash cake" even better. Love.

Cake Victory!

Last year Paul flippantly mentioned that he didn't really want a cake, but as his birthday approached he changed his mind. I was able to convince him that a Ninjago ninja would be a good idea because I figured a head was a lot simpler that some three-dimensional crazy Star Wars vehicle like last year. It was. My inspiration:

 

For those readers who don't follow Lego Ninjago, the Green Ninja is  more powerful than his other-colored buddies, and he was coveted by all the boys at Paul's elementary school this past year. See, in a clever marketing campaign, you could only get the green ninja mini-figure when you bought the Lego Ninjago Character Encyclopedia. Which the book fair sold out of in about 10 minutes. And which totally awesome Aunt Chrissy bought Paul for Christmas (innocently remarking, "Does Paul have that ninja character book thing?") Needless to say, the Green Ninja is pretty awesome, and I knew it would be a relatively easy cake to create. The trickiest part was the gold piece on his helmet. To make it, I softened caramel candies, rolled them out and pieced them together. It looked a bit like a jock strap and was only  partially edible due to the waxed paper sticking if the caramel was too melty, but it did the trick. The mask is made of fruit roll ups which I had to separate because they were in a rainbow pack. (The broken caramel and two-thirds unused roll-ups led to a bit of a sugar high.) It was Paul's idea to make the eyes from jelly beans with white sprinkles from our Christmas cookie decorations. The best part? Cool-Whip makes a new frosting that is utterly and completely amazing (and lard free!). Considering I often have frosting related debacles, I was super-excited to try it and very impressed with the results. And as the hubby pointed out as we polished off the leftovers later in the week, it even frosts cut-sides!! YAY!!!

 The boy was pleased.

Now I must figure out how to create John's request: A T-Rex. Hmmmmm.... suggestions appreciated!

To Cake or not to Cake

Last year after I put together another awesome, two-dimensional birthday cake for my eldest, he informed me that he really doesn't like cake all that much. WHAT!?!?! Fine, I replied, next year I won't make you one. Ha! What an idle threat that was. His birthday is right around the corner and while he has agreed to forgo the large friend party in order to save for a bigger, better party next year, he is not quite ready to give up the cake just yet. Once I relented (it didn't take much convincing - I look forward to the creative challenge) it was simply a matter of deciding on a design. P began to list a number of completely unrealistic possibilities. I countered with a suggestion that I knew would only require one cake. He agreed. See, every year I bake two cakes in order to complete the design, and every year most of it ends up in the trash. One cake is good. I can bring leftovers to work and anyone currently on a diet can just look the other way. P is on board with my suggestion and I have been brainstorming creative non-frosting ways to make it look authentic. Because relying on frosting is akin to cheating in my book. Anyone can frost. It takes a certain amount of creativity to figure out how to use candy, cookies and other confections to create a realistic design. I love standing in the bulk food section of the grocery store trying to figure out what I can use.
I am glad that P has decided he wants a cake and agreed to a feasible design (stay tuned). Too bad J has requested an upgrade from last year's super easy soccer ball to a dinosaur. The one with the really long neck. That's gonna be a tough one.

Tie Fighter, Travel & the Terrible Twos

P turned six in early April, and as mom does not like to disappoint her many fans, I constructed his cake in the shape of a Star Wars tie fighter. It turned out pretty well with no frosting disasters this year (I even learned how to make black frosting) and was met with public success at our first ever out-of-the-house birthday party. Note: Easiest. Party. Ever. Of course my bubble was popped when P announced that next year he just wants cupcakes. Sigh. No worries, my youngest turns three in a few months and I can focus all my creative energy on his cake. Except for the little problem of his continuous train obsession. When I ask him what type of cake he wants, he simply goes through the list of Thomas the Train characters. Seeing as I made an Edward cake last year, I just can't bring myself to do the same design again this year. I mean, where is the challenge in that? And my friends, it really is all about the challenge. This year for P's cake, I enlisted the help of two fellow Star Wars moms (thanks ladies!) to assist in the design phase. And while I may need some practice dipping twizzlers in melted chocolate (you should have seen the mess), the overall results were pretty good. Enough about the cake; here is a photo.

Moving on. As for the adults in the family, we enjoyed an amazing trip to Greece during spring break. Without. The. Children. It was originally planned for our ten year anniversary but had to be postponed due to the arrival of our second son. After spending the first 24 hours traveling and/or stuck in the Athens airport, we enjoyed a relaxing and energizing (yes it is possible to accomplish both of those feelings simultaneously) trip to Santorini and then an educational stop back in Athens before returning home. The adventure was much needed balm for the hectic pace that our lives have been functioning in back at home.
Which brings me to the third element of this entry's title: Our toddler. God bless him, he came into our lives the sweetest baby - slept without fuss (which was a huge difference from what we had been used to), ate like a champ and had a easy-going disposition. The first few months of "two-dom" went by with little complaint; he continued to be sweet with only the occasional emotional outburst. He even cooperated with potty training. We couldn't believe our luck! Then something happened. He must have gotten the memo that two is supposed to be TERRIBLE. He suddenly decided that food was more fun spread out all over the floor and regurgitated onto the table. That it was perfectly okay to break out in bloodcurdling screams at 2am when his stuffed animal fell out of the bed. That hiding under the desk and filling his pull-up is downright hysterical. And the worst: That any voice of authority has ceased to register in his hearing range. Even when the dreaded middle name is used. I know toddler hood is about finding one's way in the world and I can deal with the chorus of "I DO IT!" and the occasional assertion of defiance. But my child has gone beyond that and it is wearing us out.  Thankfully he has been interspersing moments of laughter at his developing language, which at some point I need to document. (His most recent: Mommy will you play tic-tac-two with me?) And I keep telling myself he is simply trying to navigate the world in his own way. My mother assures me that, like everything else, this too shall pass. Let's just hope we all make it out on the other side.

Cake: Version 5.0

For anyone who has been waiting on pins and needles to see pictures of this year's cake, I sincerely apologize. Here is the story, with slightly less drama than last year. After being told by my husband that I care more about impressing friends and family than making my son happy, I tried to reel it in a bit. Fortunately this year we did not hit 85 degrees the day of the party and I was able to comfortably bake the cakes required to make dueling light sabers. And because I actually listened to my mother's advice this year and used waxed paper at the bottom of the pan, the cakes came out beautifully. They were so pretty that I had to take a picture. Sadly the icing was not as pretty. I didn't measure as exactly as I should have (okay, I didn't measure AT ALL) and just went by feel. A strategy that works well when cooking - not so much when baking. The icing was lumpy and runny and did not look as fabulous as last year's batch. I kept having to scrape it off the tray and reapply. And then there was the licorice. Our local grocery store ran out of the skinny black licorice that I used in last year's drum set, and I had to settle for giant Twizlers. The problem with the bigger licorice is that it does not conform as nicely and kept popping out of the sides of the cake. CJ tried to fix the problem by shoving them into the sides but just ended up creating giant holes. Overall though, I think this year's cake was a success. Judge for yourself. The boy was pleased. In the end, that is what truly matters; although I do enjoy the accolades.

The obsession continues

P's birthday is a mere four wakeups away. And somehow I am not completely freaking out about his cake. A little background for any readers new to the blog: When I started documenting my family's life on the world wide web, I began with a photo of my first ever fully realized totally awesome birthday cake. I was told it couldn't be done. Which is not something anyone should ever say to me. When Paul turned two, he was obsessed with Elmo. So he got an Elmo cake. It was pretty darn cool. Fueled by my success, I went completely three dimensional with his three year old cake: the bulldozer (did you catch the pun???) Paul was very excited to eat all of the candy accessories as everything but the driver was edible. Last year was my biggest challenge, especially when we had a freak heat wave the day before and of his party. But the drum set came out beautifully and I was even able to share the many yards of leftover licorice with a friend making a ladybug cake. So what is in store for this year you ask? Anyone who has spent any amount of time with my oldest in the last six months knows it can only be one thing. STAR WARS. I have decided to make dueling light sabers, which should be remarkably more simple than the last two designs. I am not worried, but perhaps I should be. I want them to look authentic. You see, after spending the last six months listening to a four year old relate every minute detail from every Star Wars book he can get his hands on I have learned A LOT. It is hard not to get swept up in the obsession. The whole family sings the theme song on a daily basis, often making up new words to fit a given situation (okay that's just me). My husband administers regular quizzes to see if I can identify all of the Jedi in P's collection. And P can tell you who someone is based solely on their light saber. His cake has got to be good. Stay tuned.

My cake obsession

It's become a tradition. An expectation. A challenge that I obsess over for 6+ months. The BIRTHDAY CAKE. For Paul's 2nd birthday it was Elmo (and the launching of this blog). I was told it couldn't be done. I am just not a cake person. HA. For his 3rd birthday it was a bulldozer. And thanks to an awesome design by Amy, another huge success. Soon after he turned 3, Paul begin to shift his sites from trucks to music. He wanted a guitar cake. I started sketching. Then one day he announced he would rather have a drum set cake. Not a drum cake, a DRUM SET cake. I searched google images. I tried to envision it. Paul began setting unrealistic parameters. Multiple drums. Silver cymbals. Blue icing. I refused to let that stop me. A few days ago we began the official paper link countdown. His excitement grew. My stress grew. How on Earth am I going to pull this off? Today, steps were taken. I stood in the cake aisle at Michael's and tried not to get completely overwhelmed. I finally started to visualize the drum set. My biggest dilemma - how on earth am I going to create something thin enough to look like a high hat, yet strong enough to not crumble into pieces when propped up?? how will I prop it up??? and make it silver??????
My ever so supportive husband's thoughts? "Are you going to go this nuts over the birthday cake EVERY YEAR??" ummmmmmm....