Dannah's 18th Birthday: Moulin Rouge meets Monté Carlo

We recently had the opportunity to dig our itchy hands into the making of a spectacular 18th birthday party for a sweet young lady. In our culture, 18th birthdays are as big a deal as 21st birthdays (perhaps even more)... We didn't only get to make her cupcake tower, we also got to have fun doing crafty stuff and it was beautiful to see it all come together.
Exhausting... but exciting!

Part 1: The stationery by Milbreé moments (pictured here with cupcake samples):

Part 2: The Cupcake Tower... 

... the cupcakes:

... the cake:

... and now: THE cupcake tower assembled on our very versatile cupcake stand:

... the birthday girl and her cupcake tower 

(sorry about the photo quality - iPhone photo only):

 Part 3: Party décor and styling by Milbreé Moments:

 The glittery heart backdrop was hand-made by... us :)

Rentals from: First Scene and Centrepieces

  We had the idea of contracting a pro dance group for a special item during the party. 

The birthday girl's mom tried with all her might, 

but they all seemed pretty exclusive and elusive... 

so in true "CAN-CAN-do" spirit, Dannah's friends showed such graciousness 

and agreed to dress up as her can-can girls 

and gave a surprise dance number for her gustes:

 ... all three girls are wearing fascinators handmade by... us :)
(thanks to Dannah's mom for sharing the photo above)

We even got to be invited as guests - such fun!!!

Thank you, Dannah, for joining us in this sugary-sweet journey!

The Princess is Coming (A Baby Shower)

Once upon a time, there was a mom-to-be and a dad-to be who were gifted with a beautiful (couples) baby shower party by their family. All their closest friends and relatives came to bless them with their love and best wishes... 

But this blog really is about the gorgeous shower party decorations :) 

Starting from the hand-crafted stationery designed by Milbreé Moments (aka., Aunty Jane):

the menu-card:

name bands and a keep sake from all the guests:

to the sweet little giveaways (hot-choc drink mix in mason jars):

the 'tablescape' that's oh-so-enchanting:

... to the home-made desserts / petit fours:

  

... and fluffy pink and white marshmallows all over the place:

... to compliment the rich dark chocolate ganaché cupcakes

... and cute little decadent mini-cupcakes:

... of course, there is THE ombré-inspired frilly princess CAKE:

... with hand-crafted (by mom-to-be) crystal crown cake-topper and crystal side-accent:

... sitting all pretty on this gorgeous cupcake tower stand:

... and to put them altogether: a dessert table truly fit for a princess!

We hope you enjoyed delighting your eyes on this blog post as much as we enjoyed putting everything together. 

Thank you for joining us on this sugary-sweet journey! 

(PS. We will be a little out of action in the next couple of months 

as we await the little princess...)

Lion Cake

ROARRRRRR!

This week's post is our amateur attempt at a 'realistic' 3D cake. We know we are light years away from our inspiration, Sylvia Weinstock, but hey - we've got to start somewhere! So when a lovely young lady approached us for her 21st birthday, we accepted the challenge in sort of a 'fake it 'till we make it kind of way'. We said YES with such confidence that can move mountains, even though inside we had no clue whatsoever 

how we were going to approach the job...

So, if you feel like being critical - no worries, we're already one step ahead of yah (wink wink)!  We also have a resident-self-taught-engineer-of-some-sort (Kenneth) who is our biggest fan and most valuable critic. He reckons our proportions are not quite right. 

We cannot disagree.  

 

The inspiration photo that the lovely client gave us was of a cake made of air-brushed butter cream-iced cake. We work with fondant. And haven't yet learned to work with air brushing. Someday soon... so for now, we gotta work with what we have. 

 The cake component is creamy milk chocolate mud cake all smothered in milk chocolate ganaché. We didn't get to weigh the final product, but get this - the ganaché alone weighed 2.5 kilograms!!! The mud cake is approximately 4 kilograms in itself. We used up 1 Kilograms of fondant. We hope she serves it up, it would be a shame not to eat all that cake - NOM NOM NOM.  

 Hence, given the circumstances, we reckon not bad for a first go. Most importantly, the client was happy with her cake. And that matters to us very much: 

"Thank you both so much for your effort and kindness. I will be sure to take a pic and show you what my party ends up looking like :)" - Rez, Auckland

Thank you for joining us in this sugary sweet journey!

 

Dora cake - take 3!

There hasn't been much baking happening round here, unfortunately... but for intentional reasons: we recently moved to a new place - more space, whew! Joy is now 29 weeks pregnant (and still teaching), Jane is in her 3rd module at business school, Kenneth is now permanently busy with his various home improvement projects... on top of our usual full time jobs. 

Not much caking fun, but we are grateful nevertheless.

Here's a quick peek into our most recent project...

Now we know just how influential this Dora character is... this is the third Dora cake we have done so far, and won't be surprised if we get more. The little ones really do aDORe her! 

 Rhaeleen is such a pretty name! Long, but pretty. Her mum was quite specific about white, pink and purple being the central colour theme. The yellow is just to break the tone.

Above: a view from the top... and finally...

"Hello!!! The party was good, yes Rhaeleen loved the cake! She keeps blowing the candle and asking wheres Dora cake? Thanks again!" - Rhaeleen's Mum & Dad - Lyn & John.

Thank you for joining us in this sugary sweet journey!

A Story of "Love"

This entry is dedicated to the romantic in all of us. 

A word of warning: this story will make you fall in love. It did us.

This week, we had the gift of being part of an unfolding.

We enjoyed creating this cake,

even though we cannot truly take the full credit for its design. 

We were given specific instructions, you see:

1. There were to be tropical/palm trees.

2. There was to be a smiling, loveable turtle on the top of the cake.

 3. There was to be sand... like the beach. 

And a sign saying: "Happy Birthday Love, love you heaps!" - TJ

4. The cake was to be a picture of paradise.

5. Because it was to be a vessel for this:

Jane & her fiance, Arvee, were honored 

to have the privilege of witnessing this great moment.

When they delivered the cake (nb., we prefer delivering our creations ourselves),

"Love" (the name of our story's heroine, if you haven't already figured out) 

was on her way to pick "TJ" up from the airport 

after a 2-week work-related trip to Brissy.

In short, our delivery staff of the day were invited to stay 

for their intimate family gathering

to apparently 'celebrate Love's birthday'. 

Everyone was in on the decoy - except Love.

She said "YES" of course!

And they shall live happily ever after.

Thank you for joining us in this sugary sweet journey.