Happy Chinese New Year + Panda Bear Cake!

Happy Chinese New Year to all of my wonderful blog readers and cake pals! Hope you have a delightfully prosperous, happy and healthy 2014! Here's an older post I wrote on Chinese New Year and what it means to me.

I made this super cute panda bear face cake for sweet little one month old baby Georgia. Georgia is the newborn daughter of Olivia and Jeremy - years ago I made their wedding cupcakes! It was so nice to hear from them again when Olivia emailed me about making a welcome baby cake for her new little one. I gotta say, Olivia, you look great! Very happy for your new family of three.

xo Lyndsay

Eeks! Pink Heart Mouse Cake + Spell Your Cupcakes Love

I think my brain is programmed to see shapes as potential animal face cakes. I guess animal face cakes are kind of my delightful little cakey obsession. Not a terrible thing to be obsessed with - better than crystal meth or eating slugs, right? So when I finally bought myself one of those heart shaped cake pans in preparation for some Valentines heart-caked DIY insanity, I immediately saw two giant mouse ears and BLAMMO this kind of adorable pink heart mouse cake came to mind. Check out the whole squeaky clean DIY over at Handmade Charlotte!  

Feeling too absurdly lazy to want to procure a heart shaped cake pan and do all of that jazzy mousey piping? Here's a super simple heart-day idea: spell out some cute and non creepy greeting with delicious little mini cupcakes. If the apple of your eye doesn't think this is the cutest display of niceness and let's-get-to-know-each-other romance ever, then you should run the other way because only crazy people don't like cake! Also: old marrieds like myself can get a little jolt of romance from this kind of thing too. Everyone wins!

Ideas of things you can spell with mini cupcakes: 

1. YOU'RE MY LADY
2. HOPE YOU LIKE MINI CUPCAKES
3. HOW COOL AM I THAT I MADE YOU THIS NICE TREAT? LET'S GO OUT
4. YOU'RE ATTRACTIVE TO ME
5. HELLO, KITTY!
6. RAOWR! (this is if you're feeling extra feisty)
7. HI
8. LOVE YOU TO THE CORNER STORE AND BACK x INFINITY 
9. WE'VE BEEN MARRIED FOR 14 YEARS BUT YOU'RE STILL CUTE, BALD AND ALL
10. MON PETIT CHERI 

I chose "hi" because it's pleasantly innocuous and it let's the ruffly minis do the talking, ya know? But feel free to go wild. 

xo Lyndsay 

Fresh Floral Buttercream Rosette DIY

I was a tomboy growing up, believe it or not. Pink and purple? BAH HUMBUG, said the tomboy me of yesteryear! But today? I am a lover of all colours, guys. Plus, who could resist these hues of deep purple, velvety red rose, fuchsia and radiant orchid? Yeah, that's right - "radiant orchid", Pantone's colour of the year 2014. The name sounds like a 1990s old lady perfume-scented bathroom. But those rascals at Pantone managed to burrow a microchip colour hole into my brain and my rosette buttercream cupcakes turned out their colour. And, ok, it's a beautiful colour indeed. 

I photographed this ultra simple, bursting with girly romance DIY for Poppytalk - powerblast on over there now for the whole flower topped rosette DIY spread! 

xo Lyndsay 

And A Cool Time Was Had By All: My Cake Toppers Workshop!

Hooray! The amazing Erin of Collage Collage invited me to teach a cake toppers workshop as part of their Adult Craft Night series. I had to come up with some cute ideas to teach the attendees. I had a horse ribbon inspired cake topper in mind, and I wanted to do something with alphabet pasta letters, inspired by a super cute DIY I had seen on Oh Happy Day a few years back. I had mentally thought about (ok, let's say mind-spiraled) what I would make for weeks and then on the day of the workshop, I sat down and worked out what the projects would be, making them beforehand so I could do a cooking-show-style "voila!" reveal!

I was pretty stoked with what I ended up coming up with - these guys - Treat Yo Self alphabet pasta letter banner and You Rascal horse ribbon cake topper!

I baked up some chocolate cupcakes with vanilla buttercream and sprinkles for the workshop attendees, both to snack on while they worked and each attendee got to take one home in a cute little box, too!

What a cute bunch of crafty  ladies indeed (and a quite adorable helper, Erin G!) Adult Craft Night is such a fun way to blast away for a few hours and use your hands to create something cool. A nice break from computery internet-overload times, I would say! I want to sign up for the next one!

Can you spot Coco Cake Land in this pic? Yeah. The nerdball holding up a cake banner topper! I sure had a great time!
And take a look at these great projects my ladies made! Pretty sweet. I feel excited that all of those future birthday cakes will be dolled up by some very cute hand crafted cake toppers. Thanks again Erin for inviting me, and many thanks to my new cake pals who attended the workshop! Looking forward to doing another one in the future.

xo Lyndsay

Orange Furry Fox Cake!

I made this crazy cute orange furry fox cake for Cicely's son Charlie's birthday! I loved the idea so much I turned it into a super cute DIY! Find the whole How To Make A Fox Cake DIY over at Handmade Charlotte.

Thank you Cicely for the wonderful idea - happy 1st birthday to your adorable Charlie!

This little buddy has been pretty popular on the information superhighway - check him out as a favorite party idea on Oh Happy Day! 

Pink + Purple Ruffle Heart Cake

Have you ever had your heart broken? It really does make your chest hurt. Physiologically it's probably shock, stress, anxiety and subsequent acid reflux - heart burn! Or maybe it really is just that horrible pain of having your heart figuratively ripped out. And falling in love gives you that giddy flutter, of a gaggle of butterflies flittering around in your stomach - excitement, hope, and that deep longing for that other person! The feeling that everything is good in the world, and love is real. I think that must be where the world started in co-opting the heart as the official symbol of love.

Speaking of hearts - I really liked how this ruffly buttercream two tone pink and purple heart cake turned out - requested by Alissa for her little Eva's 4th birthday party!

A note from Eva's mom Alissa: 

"The cake was AMAZING! You should have seen Eva's face when I gave her a sneak peek before the party."

Now that is too darn cute.

Yep, heart day is coming! And here at Coco Cake Land I'll be slamming out some seriously cute and heart-y cake tutorials! If you love hearts, you're in luck - if you hate hearts, I hope you don't barf too much over all the love that'll be flowing round these parts soon!

Happy Friday, cake friends.

LOVE, Lyndsay ^__^

A Real Cool Cat: Cat Cake!

Well heeeeyyyy cat buddy! Aren't you just a fluffy and friendly looking cool little cat! I loved this sweet and cute vanilla buttercream frosted cat cake pal I made for 2 year old Zoe's birthday. It also has pink vanilla cake layer insides. Zoe's mom Cheryl had this to say, which I had to share: 

"It was the CUTEST cake ever!!! Zoe was so happy. Her reaction was incredible! Thank you! We didn't have the heart to cut into in. Thank you for making such pretty cakes!"

Making two year old kiddies happy is like, the REASON to make cakes. So cute! Happy 2nd birthday, Zoe!

xo Lyndsay 

Drippy Chocolate Nutella Birthday Cake

My man of almost 13 years (whutttt!) celebrated his birthday in December - he loves chocolate hazelnut, so I made him a dark chocolate with Nutella buttercream cake with a drippy shiny yummy ganache topping. Frigging perfect. I do love the drippy look - reminds me of Wayne Thiebaud's wonderful cake paintings! I've always loved those paintings. Thick paint spread on like a perfect buttercream as though you could eat the canvas, modest simple cakes displayed neatly, almost obsessively, side by side - ready to be sliced for eager customers or boxed up and gingerly taken home for a sweet birthday party. 

Happy happy birthday RT! Love you so much!

xo Lyndsay 

Winter Roses Wedding Cupcakes

There's something so sweet, cozy and romantic about a winter wedding. Quietly lit candles, boughs of fresh green cedar and gorgeously dark, berry hued florals. I made a small but beautiful collection of early grey tea rosette buttercream topped cupcakes and a simple cutting cake topped with fresh peonies, ranunculus and dark velvety red roses for Holly and Ben's December wedding. Pretty, simple and perfect, with a beautiful bride, handsome groom and memories of a heartfelt day to last a lifetime. Happy wedding, Holly and Ben! Thank you for having me as a part of your very special day!

xo Lyndsay 

Happy New Year! 2013 Was Pretty Sweet In Coco Cake Land!

It's been a wild and wonderful year, both cakey and otherwise. My little man Teddy turned one, my husband is plowing through his third year of medical school, Coco Cake Land celebrated its 5 year anniversary, and I managed to jam pack in some seriously fun and cute cakes, whether it was a custom cake for a loyal client or a cakey DIY for Poppytalk, Craftsy or Handmade Charlotte!



It was my goal while on maternity leave to be able to build up enough freelance work that I could stay home with Teddy - so it's been a total dream to be able to do this. I am grateful and thankful for all of the wonderful opportunities this past year! And I am SUPER pumped on 2014, so much Coco Cake Land excitement ahead, including my new blog launch (wheee!) and some very exciting projects!

Here are my favourite cakes and projects of 2013 - enjoy! Happy new year to you all - thank you so much for continuing to join me on my cake journey, you guys!





 





 

 
 
 




 

 
 

 



Phewf! I shoulda broken that up into two posts I bet... oh well!

Which Coco Cake Land cakes were your favourite??

Happy 2014 to you all, cake pals - see you real soon! 

xo Lyndsay