cat cookies and onesie cookies for a baby shower

To go along with the purple cat cake for Leona's baby shower, my good friend Diana had also asked me to make cat and onesie cookies as favors for the guests.  Using the cat logo from the baby shower invitation (designed by Diana and her husband Gavin, owners and creators of Bumble Ink), I decided to make two versions of the cat cookies - the original cat logo, and also just the cat face.

 I asked my husband to make custom cookie cutters for me, and he created both of them in one night!  He's the best!

For the cookie dough, I used my favorite homemade sugar cookie recipe, but you could of course use store bought sugar cookie dough.  After rolling out the dough, cutting out my shapes, and then baking them until golden, I whipped up my royal icing while waiting for the cookies to cool.  Once they were ready, I piped outlines on the cat cookies using stiff purple royal icing, and then filled them in with runny purple royal icing.

Then I did the same for the oneside cookies, except with this onesie cookie cutter and with white royal icing.

Once all the cookies were outlined and filled in, I let them dry overnight before piping on the details. The onesies were outlined with sage green, and I finished them by piping a tiny heart in the middle.

For the cat cookies, I used white for the details on the face, and more purple to add a final outline.

I thought the sage green royal icing matched the invitations pretty well, although the shade of purple royal icing for the cats was a bit off.  But oh well, they still looked cute!

And finally, a few pictures from the english tea themed baby shower!

purple cat baby shower cake with petal sides

Back in December, my good friend Diana threw a baby shower for her sister Leona, and she had asked me to make the cake and cookie favors for the cat-themed event.  Diana and her husband, owners and creators of Bumble Ink, had designed the cat logo for the shower invitations, so we decided I would use the same cat logo for the cake!

The baby shower colors were to be purple and green, but after a few sketches Diana and I decided that the cake would look better with just purple and white.

Diana's sister had requested anything chocolate, so I decided to make a moist chocolate cake, filled with decadent chocolate mousse.  I split each cake layer in half horizontally, giving me four layers of cake, and three layers of mousse (with a cream cheese buttercream border so that the mousse wouldn't ooze out of the cake!).

Then I did a quick crumb coat with cream cheese buttercream, and let it set in the fridge before proceeding with the petal sides.

Once the crumb coat was set, I piped my petal sides, starting with the darkest purple on the bottom, the medium purple in the middle, and white on the top.  To see more of my petal cakes, see here, here, and here (you can also see the original tutorial over at Hungry Housewife).

After piping a congratulations message on the top, I piped the outline of the cat logo, and then filled it in with a Wilton star tip.

I finished it off with a Wilton tip #2 for the details on the cat's face, and then I was done!

At the baby shower, I loved that Diana's daughter spent some time just sitting and staring at the cake ...

... until finally she could finally have a bite!

Congratulations Leona!  We can't wait to meet your new little one!

blackberry oreo ice cream, and the newest addition to our family!

As some of you may already know, three weeks ago I gave birth to my third baby!  This explains why I've been M.I.A, in case you were wondering!  But in the weeks right before I gave birth, I became really obsessed with Oreo cookies.  Especially in ice cream.  Maybe it was because I was very pregnant!  Or maybe it's just because I love Oreo cookies.  In any case, I made lots and lots of coffee oreo ice cream, as well as mint oreo ice cream.  (Those are my two current favorites!)

But after making multiple batches of each, I wanted to try something new.  So I started flipping through my copy of Sweet Cream and Sugar Cones, Bi-Rite Creamery's ice cream book (which was given to me by my good friend - thanks, Diana!).  And that's when a recipe for blackberry ice cream caught my eye.  Now, I've made Blackberry Frozen Yogurt before, but for some reason I have yet to make it in ice cream form.  So I decided to try it out - with a twist.  I've heard of blackberry chip ice cream before, basically blackberry ice cream with chocolate chips or chunks in it, so why not try it with Oreo cookies instead?

I started by cooking my blackberries with sugar on the stove for about 10 minutes, until the berries broke apart and the resulting fruity syrup had reduced.  Then I pureed it and strained it, and then made my ice cream base (the usual egg yolks, sugar, heavy cream, and milk, cooked on the stove to form a custard).  Once that was ready, I combined the custard base with the pureed blackberries, and let it cool in the fridge overnight.

The next day, I was ready to churn my ice cream!  I added my chopped Oreo cookies during the last 5 minutes of churning, and then I let it set in the freezer overnight.  And then it was time to taste it!  The blackberry ice cream was smooth, creamy, and tart.  At first I wasn't sure if the Oreo cookies went well with the blackberry.  And then I decided, yes, Oreo cookies go well with everything!  Or maybe that was just my pregnancy taste buds talking!

And now for a few pictures of the newest addition to our family, baby Micah!  He joins his siblings Matthew and Melodie, and together they are now referred to as The Three Musketeers :)

sweet pea baby shower cake

Our good friends Cindy and Kai (the same couple who I made wedding cupcake pops for a couple of years ago) were going to have a large co-ed baby shower, and asked me to make a small cake for the dessert table.  The cake would not be intended to feed the guests, rather it would just be a little cake just for Cindy and Kai to enjoy together afterwards.  They mentioned that the colors would be yellow and green, and that they would like a "sweet pea" theme, so I set out to make them a little 6-inch sweet pea baby shower cake!

For the filling, I decided on freshly whipped cream and sliced strawberries, since I know Cindy likes her desserts on the lighter side and not too sweet.

For the cake, I made two 6-inch chocolate cake layers - the layers came out rather tall, so I decided to split them in half, giving me 4 chocolate cake layers.

Then I whipped up a batch of cream cheese buttercream, colored the majority of it a golden yellow, did a quick crumb coat of frosting, and then covered the sides with a basketweave design using a Wilton #47 tip.

After mixing all the frosting colors that I would need for my sweet pea design (chocolate brown, green, darker green, and ivory for a flesh tone), I piped the sweet pea in the middle of the cake, followed by a congratulations message in chocolate brown frosting.

The baby shower was a blast; there were lots of games and activities, and they had a mix of all their favorite foods and desserts.

My favorite part was the hands-free baby bottle beer drinking contest!

Congratulations Cindy and Kai!  Thanks for inviting us to celebrate with you, and I hope you enjoyed the cake!

pink and white baby shower cookies and macarons

To go along with the elephant baby shower cake that I made for my friend Helen's baby shower, I also made elephant cookies, onesie cookies, and pink strawberry macarons for the dessert table!

For the elephant cookies, I used my favorite sugar cookie and royal icing recipes.  Once the dough was chilled, I rolled it out, cut out my elephants, then baked them at 350F for 10-12 minutes.

Once they were cooled, I outlined them with pink stiff royal icing, and then filled them in with pink runny royal icing.

After letting the cookies dry for a few hours, I used a darker shade of pink to pipe the outline and the ears, and then the eyes with black royal icing.

For the onesie cookies, which I've made several times in different colors (see here, here, and here), I followed the same steps, except that I made them white with pink outlines, and little pink heart in the center of each onesie.

Then I let the cookies dry overnight, before wrapping them in cellophane bags tied with raffia and a custom favor tag.

Next for the macarons!  For the macaron shells, I used the same recipe as I did here, but made them pink with strawberry filling like I did here.  Except I made them a darker pink.  Then I piped them on a silpat, and let them rest for 20 minutes before baking them.

They came out of the oven with beautiful ruffled feet!

Then I filled them with cream cheese buttercream mixed with fresh strawberry puree.

You can click here to see more pictures of the baby shower, which was featured on the Hostess With The Mostess blog!