Fabulous February...this is how we take a break!

It hardly seems possible that it's 2011 already! And not only that, we're almost a quarter of the way through this year.

February ended up being a much-needed month of rest for the two of us, business-wise. We kept pretty busy (busier than our hubbies might have liked) through the Fall and Winter and it was nice to have a month without orders just to catch our collective breaths.

We did, however, squeeze in a cake decorating class that we called, Fun with Fondant. We had 7 students around the prep space in the kitchen we rent for baking. After only 45 minutes of instruction, we let them loose on their own 6-inch round cake with frosting and a ball of fondant to roll and drape over their cakes. We were pretty impressed with their learning curve and creativity.

Launa with her "quick study" students

Patti getting fancy with fondant...making flowers for her "hat cake."

Her hat turned out great!

 One student learned so much that she was able to make her daughter's first birthday cake...and she did a great job! For more photos of our student's work, check out our Facebook page.

Just because we weren't on the Plum Crazy clock, didn't mean that the cakes stopped. Heather ended up doing an impromptu fondant class for two sisters in Henderson, NV when she visited their family for a weekend. Selah, 9, ended up being an excellent student and worked hard at rolling out the pink fondant (she picked out the color) and making heart cut-outs for the Valentine's Day themed cakes.


Selah making heart cutouts

Putting fondant hearts on cupcakes  

Little sister, Mercy, also enjoyed decorating the cakes. She thought it was an awful lot like playing with Playdoh. Although, she had more fun licking the powdered sugar off the of the counter when Heather made the fondant.


Mercy was a natural.



Mercy's finished cake. (Baby Ayin didn't help, he just supervised.)

 Heather even made a special Valentine's Day cake for the girls' parents.

Launa also stayed busy with cake. She made their daughter, Mila, a fabulous Super Why cake for her 5th birthday party.

Mila loves watching Super Why on PBS



Fondant covered "books"



A super cake for a super sweet little girl

So, as you can see, we've stayed plenty busy. Now if only we could find the time to sit down and do our business taxes...but that's a whole other blog post.

Coasting into 2011

Well, as you can tell, we fell off the face of the blogging earth. Add in 7 children between us, one surprise pregnancy (Launa, not Heather), Christmas, New Year's, 2 teacher husband's home for three weeks, and all the other stuff and you can understand why we've been MIA.

We've stayed busy though. In January, we did a cake for a friend's baby shower. After a decade plus of trying to conceive, our friend Amy recently gave birth to a daughter. It was amazing to be a part of that special event.

Cake in honor of sweet Emery Rose, who showed up not too long after her baby shower

We also provided a 3D carved cake for little Noah who turned two. His dad is a pretty amazing designer (he did our Plum Crazy logo, so we might be biased, but we don't think so!) and it was a trade for services. We hope that Noah and his parents enjoyed his Noah's Ark cake as much as we love our logo (although we can't eat ours and there's was perishable.)

Typical sight when we're baking up a storm.

It took an entire batch of fondant to cover this board for the "grass."

Launa carving the cake and "glueing" pieces together with frosting

 Finger-piped animals for the ark

We used a "wood grain" stamp template to make the fondant look like planks of wood and then used a gumpaste tool to poke holes in the planks for the "nails."

Putting the cake together on the board with animals and bushes

Close up of Mr. & Mrs. Tiger before the Ark "Wheel House" was put on

We had a visiting "sous chef" that night. Launa's husband, Jeff, graciously allowed their "date night" to be cake night so that we could get the cake done at a semi-resonable hour on this Friday night. It also allowed for a rare photo opportunity with the both of us. Thanks Jeff!

Another late night in the kitchen, but another work of art done

The next day, Launa put the finishing touches on the cake and then took it over to Noah's party.

The finished cake

Sheepish sheep.

Pig and boat detail

Thanks KC and Rebecca for letting us be a part of Noah's 2nd birthday!