Holiday Party Idea: Pink + Green Cupcakes

Make cupcakes for your holiday party this year! Update the classic Christmas colours with a party blaster of light pink, a fresh raspberry for contrast and green cupcake liners. Totally cute, totally party time and a nice modern feel.Find me elsewhere this week: Check out my post I wrote for Craftsy on how a blog may help your cake business! As you know,I'm a blog lover and fanatic - but along the way it's really helped Coco Cake Land grow! Plus my favourite holiday DIYs of the week: Sparkly sweet DIY geometric pastel garlands from La Maison De Loulou.This adorable and majorly simple gold triangle garland from Almost Makes Perfect!The cutest mini boxwood wreath DIY via Poppytalk. The most gorgeous photos of Linda's soft gingerbread cake with creamcheese frosting over at Call Me Cupcake - these photos will make you cry deep, beautiful Christmas tears, they're so lovely!Happy weekend, everyone!xo Lyndsay 

Peppermint Party - Silver Fringe Letter Garland DIY

Today's post is sponsored by Minted.com 

Happiness and joy - I finally made something fringe! I admire my pal Kelly over at Studio DIY's magical wicked awesome fringed wonders all the time - I pin them and drool over them and say, oh yeah. I'll make that - but never get around to it! My peppermint party for Minted seemed like the perfect opportunity to make a silver fringe letter garland - since I'm nuts about lettering and typography, too. Plus, I'll let you in on an easy breezy supplies secret - (also known as: didn't have time to source silver mylar) - I used regular old tin foil and some recycled cardboard to make it. 

You can find everything you need to make this super cute JOY letter garland in your own home, bringing some wordy sparkle to your holiday this year. 

I was also inspired by the insane in the membrane crafty awesome Jenny over at Hank + Hunt - I saw her super cute LOVE letter garland and I... loved it. Hee! 

Here we go - get into the garland party zone!

You will need: 

• Tin foil, cut into strips - I cut mine into 1 inch tall strips. 
• Scissors
• Gluestick
• Cardboard
• String
• Tape

Step One: Cut out your letters from cardboard. I freehand drew my letters onto the cardboard - if you wanted a particular font you could always print out large letters off your computer, trace onto cardboard and work from there. My letters are about 8 inches in height. 

Step Two: Cut strips of tin foil off in 1 inch high strips. Start fringing away your strips - snip snip snip! Approximate the length across the letter you're working on and cut to the general size. Note that the tin foil has one extra shiny side and one more matte side. Glue down your first fringed tin foil strip, shiny side up, at the bottom of the letter and work your way up. Don't worry if your tin foil fringe length is too wide for the letter you're working on - you can trim it up later. 

Pretty fringey bits! You can save this for table confetti if you like - so shiny!

Step Three: Turn your letter around. Trim away the excess tin foil along the edge of your letter to regain the shape of your letter.

Oh joy, you finished! Yay! In the end I decided to cut a triangle V out of my letter "Y" to make it look more "Y"-like. Then I had a fringey little triangle shape, so of course I turned it into a cake topper.

 Step Four: Turn your letters over and adhere it to a nice piece of string or twine using good old scotch tape.

Minted has these ridiculously adorable and insanely easy to use tissue paper fans for sale that add so much cuteness to your party set up in literally twenty seconds. If you are familiar with my party design style, I like a simple mix of modern, vintage, DIY and playful. The tissue paper fans did the trick as a sweet backdrop for my JOY garland. 

It wouldn't be a Coco Cake Land party without a cake! I made a chocolate cake with mint green peppermint buttercream piped in a vintage style. That "V" shape? I taped it onto a wooden BBQ stick and BLAMMO - cake topper! :) I found those pretty pastel scotch winter mints in the bulk section of the grocery store. 

Minted makes the cutest custom holiday cards probably ever! Love how my card turned out with my little T-man. It was so easy to make, too - go internets go!

Ah, DIY love! What word(s) would you make into a shiny silver letter garland? That was fun - see you soon, cake pals!

xo Lyndsay 

This post was sponsored by Minted.com. Order your Minted holiday cards now - total cuteness awaits! Tissue paper fans, cake stand, little cake sign and holiday cards also provided by Minted. All opinions expressed are my own - yes, I do love Minted! 

Cotton Candy Cake

Does anyone else love thin as air, wisps of nothing spun sugar cotton candy? Pale pink sugar threads fluffing and puffing up like a beehive wig, melting into your tongue like magic.

We took Teddy to our city's annual fair this past summer and I felt inspired by the cotton candy sticks in pale bubblegum pink and light turquoise.

My plan was to make cotton candy topped cake - but I didn't realize that cotton candy deflates like a tired balloon. I had purchased a take home bag of pink and blue cotton candy to bring home for my cake project, but when I went to get it from my cake cupboard, it had hardened down to flat dehydrated blocks! Rats - I had missed my chance!

Still, I felt inspired by those beautiful colours and made this adorable pastel cotton candy coloured cake instead.

COTTON CANDY CAKE MINI TUTORIAL 

1. Using your favourite vanilla cake mix, divide batter into two medium bowls. I love Rosie at Sweetapolita's fantastic recipes for both cake and buttercream.

2. Use a tiny dab of pink gel colour for the cotton candy pink and a tiny dab of sky blue colour for the cotton candy blue. Mix batter gently until coloured.

3. Pour batter into four greased and parchment paper lined cake pans - I used 7 inch round cake pans.

4. Bake according to recipe's instructions.

5. Let cool, then frost with your favourite vanilla buttercream. I used a basketweave tip to create the fine-line ribbon look. Top with a fresh single raspberry. So cute!



Come on, take a bite! Who could resist such cute pastel cake layers?

PS - you can also find me elsewhere here: 

Craftsy! Check out my post on drool-worthy simple and pretty cakes by some of my favourite cake designers.

Handmade Charlotte! So stoked to be a new contributor to one of my favourite children's design blogs. So many beautiful ideas, delivered daily! Please visit my Fluffy Lamb Cake DIY I made for them! xo

Have an awesome weekend, cake pals! 

 xo Lyndsay

Cake, photos and styling by Lyndsay Sung // Coco Cake Land

Simple Black and White Party + Cake

I love a good black and white colour scheme for a party. It can look totally modern, or in this case: vintage modern! I used a black and white graphic vintage tablecloth from the 1970s (a hand-me-down from my mom) and for display, a cool metal letter E I got from The Land Of Nod. 

Not only does a vintage-look metal letter look great for parties but you can hang it on your wall or tuck it onto a bookshelf once the party is over for eye-catching and forever-cool decor!

A vanilla buttercream frosted cake gets the sprinkles treatment.

Other simple ways to create unity in a simple color scheme without spending a load of cash? Cake flags made from fancifully designed Japanese washi tape in coordinating colors, and another lovely garland made from two dozen cupcake liners, splayed open and taped along a standard string. 

Happy merry making, everyone! 

xo Lyndsay

Thank you to Land Of Nod for sending me the awesome metal letters.

Knot Too Shabby: Sailboat Cake + Easy Cupcake Liner Garland

Guys. This is as easy as 1-2-3. We're talking easy party idea! "Mellow sailing theme!" 

 Make a sweet and easy garland using about 24 mini cupcake liners.

 

 Make some cute sailboat themed toppers using craft paper, wooden skewers and washi tape!

Pipe your cake with a wavy buttercream ocean top!

 

 Now, party all day and sleep all night! (that's the dream of the new moms!) I'll have a medium-large slice, please! Muffin top for-eva!

You can read more about this ridiculously easy party idea over on my guest post at the awesome blog You Are My Fave!

Pretty as a Peacock Party Cake!

 

Our friend Joel is celebrating a super special milestone this month - marking one year of sobriety. He is a die-hard NHL Vancouver Canucks fan (even though he is from Montana) and has never been to a hockey game - so it seemed like the coolest and most special gift ever to give him two tickets to a Canucks game! We celebrated his one-year with a blue and green party!

I'm kind of into the idea of minimalist parties these days - maybe I have dessert table fatigue? Of course I love design and matchy matchiness and craft and the love and care that goes into a mega- coordinated party... but sometimes it's nice to just throw something together on the casual. I feel inspired by Jordan at Oh Happy Day for that. Her parties always feel like just enough party-time-ness - there's a modern simplicity to it - but never overdone.

Or, maybe I've just become party-lazy!!! Ha...

For party decor, I purchased two rolls of crepe paper streamers in blue and green at my local party supply shop for $2 each, and used them to make minimal decorations around the house. The good thing about minimal decor is it's not going to cost you an arm and a leg. I twisted the two together to make a loose easy garland around the window, then cut strips of streamers in alternating colours and taped them up to the doorway! I "finished" the edges by cutting a little "V" shape into them - nerd alert!

Testing out frosting styles with my two-toned buttercream!

And a close-up of the finished cake ... Isn't this, in TLC's words, crazy sexy cool!? Ha. Head on over to CRAFTSY for the full peacock coloured buttercream cake tutorial! Yes, I'm writing for the awesome Do It Yourself blog Craftsy now and I'm very excited about it!

And there ya go. Perfect for a simple birthday party, or a bridal shower, or a peacock themed party... or a one year sobriety party! Hooray Joel! We are so happy for you.

What are some of your favourite "throw a party on the fly" tricks? Would love to hear. 

xo Lyndsay