"Hi, we're having a birthday party for my daughter, and we'd like you to make the cake. Can you make a high heel?"
"Sure thing. How big do you need it?"
"Enough to feed 150 people, and we'd like it to match her dress. I'll have her send you a picture."
"Wow."This time we had more time to plan and prepare. :)
I met with the the mother and daughter in their home with cameras rolling. We'd already had a pretty good idea what we were looking for because I'd done some lengthy research on high heels, their construction, etc. I found a nice designer high heel with a red sole (I'm told those are pretty pricey) and started sketching designs for supports. We knew we were going to "fill in" the shoe so that there was enough cake for everyone.
During the meeting, they came up with some pretty rockin' ideas for the shoe. Fuchsia to match the dress, lots of sparkle, edible diamonds in the silver leaf of the design, silver soles, and a personalized "brand" name for Hope.
After conversing with my father (a.k.a. the carpentry guru for That Little Cake Place) we designed and constructed the "skeleton" of the shoe. This was started on Monday night and completed on Tuesday.
We added green Styrofoam under the angled portion and sculpted it to give us the ball and heel shape of the shoe.
I started baking Monday night with the help of my sous chefs. We baked 4 half-sheet cakes in vanilla flavor Monday, baked 2 additional half-sheets on Tuesday, and made all of the pink cream cheese icing. Wednesday evening I started putting together the cake and realized that we hadn't baked enough, so I did an emergency baking session Thursday morning before I went to work.
While I finished putting the cake together and covering it with icing, my assistant, Amy, tinted the other half of the fondant fuchsia.
With the sole and insole covered with gray fondant that will be painted silver later, and some fuchsia on the toe.
Completely covered in fondant.
The following are "finished" shots on my kitchen counter. I'll admit the lighting isn't all that great so you can't see the true color, but you get the idea. We covered the entire cake in pink cake sparkles to make it look like a sequined shoe, put the silver leaf pattern on and added clear edible diamonds for emphasis.
You can barely see it, but there are fuchsia edible diamonds around the top edge of the shoe. Here is Hope's "brand" on the insole.
And more various angles for your viewing pleasure...
And here it is at the venue. There was better lighting there, as you can tell...
There were also lights built into the board so that when the lights were dimmed, they shone on the cake and made it sparkle. When Amy and I delivered the cake at 2 p.m. Friday, it was just us and the film crew. They added the sticky notes to make sure no one would touch the cake, mistaking it for a non-edible center piece.
In speaking with Hope's mother later on, she said no one believed it was cake until they cut it. That's the kind of compliment that makes my day and gives me a warm fuzzy feeling about what I'm doing.
Happy birthday, Hope!
Our final birthday exhibit is from a friend at work. Her mother turned 60, and she wanted a cake with flowers and this little heart-felt message.
Here is the birthday girl with her cake. I threatened to keep the cake if she didn't pose for a picture with it... apparently cake is very persuasive. I'm told she sniffed the cake the entire way home, and then rationed thin slices to the members of her family.
This was for his father's March birthday. I know, it is late, but you can't exactly mail a cake like this through the US Postal Service.
His first comment was that we got the colors right. For once, being obsessed with details paid off. For this we made yellow cupcakes with coconut milk for just a hint of flavor, white chocolate icing, and a circle of fondant painted to resemble the 
Interesting what can be done with a couple of paint brushes, some icing dye, a little water, a paper towel, and a lot of imagination (sprinkle a little patience in there too. It took 2 hours to paint this car!!).
I made the inside of the cake out of chocolate cake with Mounds filling (think "
Here we are with his cake at the party. I should mention that we're now even since he blew hot wax from the candles on me!
This was a yellow 1/4 sheet cake with Tinkerbell on the top. Sofia liked orange, so I made her flowers to match. To make Tink, I used the same "icing drawing" that I used for many of my other character cakes, but to give her that sparkle, I dusted her wings and the cake around her with cake sparkles. Instead of a shell or other piped boarder, I opted to give her a garden of flowers around the edge of the cake.
If you caught that, her name is Sofia (with an F). While I was talking to her mother about the cake, I was in Weis Market and I thought she said "S"... lesson learned here? Always verify details through email.
Ah, now this is more like it. Audie was a BIG Pooh Bear fan back in the day. Unfortunately, summer heat and cakes with icing don't exactly mix.
