Sports Theme Baby Shower Cake

Here is a fun little easy buttercream iced cake that was set for a baby shower party at our elementary school for one of our teaching assistants. Not too long back I was asked by my sister in law to do something in a sports theme for her sister for a baby shower and I started searching Sports Theme'd Baby Showers. A cake popped up that had a border of various balls used for sports and I filed that away in my head.

Then when my friend, Tim, husband of Catherine, asked me if I would make the cake for the teacher and that it was going to be a baby boy and they would do sports.........I already had my idea.

I took some fondant and shaped some easy baseballs, footballs and golf balls. You can't see it, but the golf balls have a texture to them. Supposedly making them more golf ball like.

Then I drew a bunch of green and blue lines - AS YOU CAN CLEARLY SEE. Cute & Easy!!

This cake was half Chocolate and half Butter. Iced in a Vanilla buttercream and just a touch of vanilla fondant for deco.

I think I have this now.......Progression Series

Okay I am pretty certain that at this point I have the BASICS of cake balling down. A week ago I have the cutest cake to do for a family that loves a football team. So I needed to carve the cake........and my new - well I was going to say "motto" is never throw cake away, but that would be totally a lie because just yesterday I threw a ton of cake away because I didn't have time to make cake balls. Given that and not wanting to make myself look thriftier with cake then I am......I will simply say that it is my new "goal" to try to use every bit of cake. In this particular instance I was totally able to.

Also to become a better cake baller (this is what you should call your friends that do cake balls by the way. for no particular reason. just because it sounds sporty. totally expect them to look at you weird though. then laugh to yourself - in your head so they don't think you are certifiable.) - anyway - also.....to become better at cake ball making - I have been using different types of chocolate. Michael's had a sale going this week where there melt chocolates were a good deal - and on top of that I had a 25% off your entire sale coupon - BONUS (gotta love Michaels coupons!) - so I tried those. They melted like cotton candy in humidity (this really happened to some cupcakes I made - ugh cotton candy melts in humidity - who knew? - yeah I know EVERYONE knows - my 3rd grader told me all about it).

Anyway - the cake balls above are the ones that I made to see how the candy would coat. Pretty nicely. Fairly easily. I just need to figure out how to get the cake ball off the spoon without making a mess. Still .... they look like cute little chocolates.

The bulk of the cake mixture went to making these.....footballs. Remember - the cake ball mixture came from a carved cake that was for a football cake. I figured what better way to use the finished cake balls then give them to the family having the party. I asked if they would let me do this - wanted to make sure because you never know when you will show up with something to a party and find out "Dang Patti wish you would have asked - WE HATE CAKE BALLS!!" Silly sounding? Maybe, but you never know when a persons Great Aunt Milly choaked on a cake ball and caused an accident while driving that ran over another persons prized personally genetically developed apricot colored roses that were going to fair for competition and Great Aunt Milly ruined them due to cake ball chokage - was sued by the guy with the roses and won and poor Milly ended up working at Walmart in her retirement because she lost everything in the law suit. You Just Never Know......so I called ahead and asked permission.

They granted it. So I decided to make Cake POPS!! What is the difference between a Cake Ball and a Cake Pop? Duh - the stick!!

Notice that the stick is a REAL BONAFIDE stick this time? Not a cut off straw? I learned - sticks can hold the weight!! Who knew? Yeah yeah my 3rd grader. "Whatev's" as my 6th grader would say.

Basically what I did was roll the cake mixture out onto the counter and cut them with an oval shaped cookie cutter. Simple simple simple. If you do this - roll the mixture out thick. The first couple I did them normal size for a cookie, but you have to stick a stick in them and this makes the mixture less sturdy On The Stick. Of course after cutting the mixture into ovals I then stuck a stick in them and kinda compressed them a bit to make sure there wasn't a lot of air around the stick area.

Following that I dipped them into the melted chocolate. This is a step I still need to perfect. I used an icing spatula spreader thing (they might be called something different at your store if you go looking for them) and gently shaped the chocolate around the football as the excess chocolate dripped back into the bowl - then set them down on a piece of parchment paper to dry. This was pretty quick. Time example - ate dinner - cleaned the table - came back to these and they were ready for the football lines. Since I had some left over black icing from another cake I did that day I used it to make the lines. It seems to me that most footballs have white lines for the strings, but I didn't Google it.


The finaly project I let dry overnight. Some of the footballs fell off their sticks because I - a) rolled the first batch out too thin and they didn't stay attached to their sticks and the chocolate added caused too much stress and they broke off - and - b) I am sometimes clumsy.

In the morning I popped the Cake Pops into bags and tied green ribbons on them. As my sister-in-law and I have learned.......many sites that ship cookies & cake balls advertise that they do this for YOUR display purpose and for Added Freshness. I personally think it is so they don't melt together. Regardless they made really cute little party favors.

The balls in the top picture went to the neighbors after dinner the night I made them. Feedback on them were they were delish!!

These were Deep Chocolate Cake with Vanilla buttercream and Chocolate Mlets on the outside. They really were yummy.

Coach Tim

This is a cake I did a bit ago. Never was caught up with the cakes and now I find that since I have let myself fall another week + a few days behind it might take me a bit longer. Still Tim's cake has been waiting and waiting and waiting - and I know Catherine likes to look at the pictures and I know it is fun to see things that you recognize.

Tim is one of my favorite people - he is part of one of my favorite families too! and husband to one of my favorite friends. When Catherine asked me to make him a cake she said "simple". I am totally good with simple, but Catherine keeps sending me her friends and they have me do creative things.........so I wanted to do Creative for Catherine too. I asked her if there wasn't something that he enjoys (if you know them you know that they are huge WV fans..........so I kinda figured she might say something in that line) - Catherine said no, not really.

Through the year Tim has been subbing for one of our gym teachers. I see him all the time at school in his "Coach" uniform with a whistle hanging around his neck. That is how I have been thinking about him in my head......as Coach Tim........I asked if I could deco the cake with a coach whistle and Catherine said that would be fun.

I didn't realize how "not so easy" making a whistle would be. And my in-experience with modeling things did not lend itself to being over successful the first few tries with modeling a whistle. Eventually, however, I was able to figure it out. I let it dry for a few days and then I painted it with Silver Luster dust and let it dry again - then attached the pieces together - let it dry again for another day. The one thing I am learning is that anything fondant modeling based I should start about 5 days ahead of time. I am also learning that fondant takes longer to dry then gumpaste. At this point though I wasn't quite ready to admit that gumpaste was a bit easier to use.

Day of the birthday I baked the cake. Catherine said simple and chocolate - so simple and chocolate is what I did. A basic cake with a basic icing and a kinda fun little swirl and a trim that looked a bit like a fancy rope.

Next I topped it with the whistle and a thin line of fondant for a rope. Now this is one way that using gumpaste might have been smarter. The fondant thread I created kept breaking when I would attempt to move it up onto the cake. Gumpaste is a bit hardier and could have been moved easier. Live and learn right?

End of cake deco though..........and tah dah...........a Coach Tim cake!! Cute and simple. Now Catherine tells the story that when they presented it Tim really enjoyed it. He was planning in his head to save it and take it to work to show people.......only before he could say what his plan was his daughter (my favorite friend of Andersen's - see how their family is full of favs?) plucked the whistle off the cake and bit it in half. Whoops.

This cake was Chocolate Chocolate Chip with a Chocolate Buttercream icing.

Cody's BlackHawks Jersey

This cake was for our friends - who are a SUPER FREAK hockey family. Well they LOVE many different sports, but hockey seems to be a Big Time favorite of theirs. Cody is my sons Bestest Ever friend. They have been in class together all but one year so far. And it was Cody's birthday - AND he is a fabulous hockey players - so guess what this cake will turn into...........

As you saw above - step one was to take a square cake and shape it to look a bit like a shirt - the next step was to figure out the fondant layering so that I could create the look of a neck - and that is this........
Next layer of fondant covered most of the body of the cake - see what we are going for now? A hockey jersey.

Then I covered the lower half with white fondant - then I did stripes of black - and now it looks like a Black Hawks jersey!! Right?

Add a number. Now cutting this number out free handed was not quite as simple as I thought, but not terrible - still I can now see the merit in having a fondant cutter like a Cricuit to cut out the numbers electronically. Will I run out and get one? No, but I will consider it when I am rolling in dough..........get it? Rolling In Dough? Come on that was funny - admit it.
Next were the sleeves. Way easier then the last jersey sleeve I did a few months back - because I have gotten smarter - roll thicker and move sooner - tah dah!!

Then the logo. This one I thought would be more of a challenge then it was. I used cookie cutters and then molded the shapes to be what the logo looked like. Placed it on a black fondant background and cut around that........

and it turned out really cool! I let it sit a little while (20 min maybe) so that the sugar was more set in the fondant and would stay together better. Then I transferred it to the sleeve shoulder.

What surprised me was that the logo was actually bigger then the shoulder area. Sure if I had measured I would likely have seen that it would be too big, but who does smart stuff like that? Not me obviously!! So I chopped the part of the logo off that didn't fit and ironically it gave it a much more realistic look. Or so I told myself. ;0)

Then I piped the name of the Hockey Birthday Boy onto the cake.........with buttercream - because after hand cutting the BIG numbers the thought of hand cutting TINY letters was daunting - plus the family said I could just letter with icing. For that size though I am going to look for some block letter cookie cutters - they would work perfect.

The whole cake turned out super. And honestly.......I think the parents were WAY more excited then the birthday boy. It was so cute - during the whole process of finishing the cake Sheri would call and say "text me the next picture" - to the point that after a bit I texted her and said, "shhhhh I am working - be quiet"........course we were teasing each other - I loved that she wanted to see each step probably as much as she loved seeing them. She is one of my biggest Cheerleaders!!

This cake was Marble - Chocolate and White - with a Vanilla buttercream and a Vanilla Fondant top. Go Black Hawks!!

For Jimmy & MaryJo

This post is a quickie for Jimmy & MaryJo..........Dave will love them for this. On facebook they made the comment that they were tired of the Cubs stuff and wanted to see some Cardinals things. Problem is...........no one says "Make me a Cardinals cake!!"......which surprises the heck out of me since I live in a house where 3 out of 5 of us are Freaks about the STL Cards!

Each year at Dave's work he takes in a treat for his birthday to share with his friends. One year this is what he asked for. This was probably 3 years back when I was first starting to mess around decorating cakes. And Yes.........he asked to have a Cubs logo on it too so as not to offend any of the friends that he razzes about their team being completely inferior to the Cardinals.

So Jimmy so far this is the most I have done in reference to the Cardinals..........wanna to have a Cards cake for your birthday?

This cake was Chocolate with a Chocolate Buttercream icing. Reese's Peanut Butter cups chopped up and scattered all over it. The cupcakes were also Chocolate with a Vanilla Buttercream icing.

Black Hawks for Jimmy

I have had the chance to tackle more Sport theme'd things lately. My own kids always go for the weirdly unique and/or animally things........other kids (boys Ben knows) seem to like the traditional sports things. This one was fun though......and I will admit to having almost fallen apart doing it from frustration, but in the end it worked out and looked pretty impressive.

My biggest hurdle was the part that was WAY simpler to make then I had thought. The Jersey! Goodness........this jersey was my slight fear. What kind of a template to use.......in the end I just rolled out the fondant and cut the shape of the shirt - and it worked!! The part that made me come to tears was moving it onto the cake though - no spatula big enough for a jersey to fit a 1/2 sheet cake and the arm started to tear off during the process.

What to do What to do.........well fondant is sugar.........so I wetted the ripped area down and started to smooth the tear together - kinda like water and sugar welding. Also put a smidge of buttercream over the top to make the sugar look smoother. AND IT WORKED!!

The only other hardship was that I was in a time crunch and didn't roll the fondant out large enough to cover a 1/2 sheet. This was my first time trying to cover a cake that large. Instead of rerolling the fondant I just said a curse word (my automatic backup plan) and then cut the fondant so it only fit the side - piped on some black buttercream - rolled out some red fondant to use as edging around the cake - and that was that. I actually thought that looked nicer then the original "all white" idea. Made it look less girly - if that is possible.

All the fondant sports equipment I made a few days earlier. So they were all hard and solid for standing up like I posed them on the sides - and for on the top of the cake so they didn't sag and look unreal.

Ben said the kids loved it at the Ice Skating Party. So TAH DAH!! I would bet that I redo this cake another time in the future too.

This cake was Half White cake and Half Chocolate Chocolate Chip cake.........Vanilla Buttercream icing inside and a Vanilla Fondant with tinted Buttercream for the deocrations. Yum!

1st & 10 - Bet we'll do it again.......

Cupcake Time Again!! The whole time I was making this cupcake I was thinking - "Bet someone will ask me to do this one again".......which made me start chanting a cheerleader ditty we did in highschool........"First and Ten do it again........move that ball!"

Originally my friend - who ordered them for her son - wanted 13 White and 13 Chocolate. I thought about that........kid standing there in the middle of class to hand out his birthday treats and half are chocolate half are white...........that is a lot of negotiating - "I want a chocolate one" - "I don't like"...."Jimmy I will be your friend if you......." So I suggested to my friend to pick just one flavor to keep it easy to pass out. She agreed and went chocolate.

Then on the way to religion class one night the Birthday Boy talked about his order and told me they were half white half chocolate. I let him in on the conversation his mom and I had and he said he really really wanted to make sure every person got what they wanted - and asked if I could make each cupcake half and half. How can you pass that request up? I mean he is the Birthday Honoree and HE is trying to make sure everyone else gets what they want.

Too Sweet - Order Changed - Mom was updated - All was good!

Although often times when you put something on top that is decorative - the kids don't even notice the cake flavor. And really if we are being honest - most of the kids suck the icing off the top and toss the cake. For the under 10 set the cupcake is often just a carrier for the icing.

These cakes were obviously half White cake and half Chocolate......with a Chocolate Buttercream icing and a Vanilla Buttercream grass & Vanilla Fondant football on top.

Total Goal!!

40 Cake

An earlier email alerted you to the fact that Dave turned 40!! Well since it was posted early in the day it didn't also say we had a SURPRISE PARTY for him. And..........he was TOTALLY suprised!!

When we discussed his birthday cake he said "No Fondant".....hmmmm....makes the cake a little less exciting....."very little icing"........hmmm....that makes it hard to decorate anything elaborate.....and he wanted a Chocolate Chocolate Chip cake...........hmmm....that makes it hard to cut things into shapes that we could put just a little icing on - dang he tied my hands up a lot.

Still - we started with a cake shaped like a rectangle.

And eventually made it to a Zero.........half of the number.........

Forty!! We (Andersen and the boys were helping on this one - I spend all my time saying "No you can't help this is for a special occassion that someone has trusted me to help create" that it was nice to say "Daddy would love you to be part of this creation". And so the number 40 was decided upon.

I "Dirty Iced" the cake as Ben likes to say - others know this as "Crumb Coating". I also put the basic layer of icing on as chosen by the kids - Red on one side and White on the other - for the St. Louis Cardinals.

Then the boys disappeared. Honestly it was never a great idea to have given Dawson an icing bag - more would have gone in his mouth then on the cake. Ben seemed to be overwhelmed by the thought of having to come up with his own idea - he is apparently a very good director (everyone has their strengths right?). Andersen stayed to the end though. She did all the decorating.

She did all the lettering and it was she who came up with the ideas for the pictures that represented Dave. She also executed them. There were tears. It was kinda like what I imagine it was like when I first started. Dave calming me down - me getting tense - scraping off icing - frustrated that it was so hard to hold the dang icing bag. All the same things Andersen complaind about.

Yet she did FABULOUS!! The cake was Super Cute!!

She represented Dave's love for the Cardinals - Baseball and playing Softball - a Grill for his master Grilling Skills - a Hammer for his Woodworking - and a Computer for his wonderful IT abilities...........she got him!!

The cake was Chcocolate Chocolate Chip and Banana with a Vanilla Buttercream icing.

WWE Cake