Garden Cuteness Vegan Cake! Growing Carrot Garden Cake!

The cuties at Drive Organics (an organic grocery store in my neighborhood) ordered this adorable garden-themed cake for their boss Jeff, who is venturing off into opening his own organic grocery store land in North Vancouver! The cake was a vegan dark chocolate cake with chocolate ganache filling and vanilla "butter"cream! This was lots of fun to make, fondant carrots popping up through "dirt" (dark chocolate cookie crumbs) and piped all over to be bright green and grassy! Plus, a little snail buddy!

Thanks Drive Organics people! And good luck Jeff in your exciting new venture! ^__^

WOOF! Amy's "Dogs Playing Poker" Birthday!

My little buddy! FluffPup the peanut butter frosting dog!

The party inspiration. Dogs playing poker poster.

I made dog masks out of felt for my hubby and I!

The ever-adorable birthday girl Amy,
and Coco Cake Boss as a jaunty JAZZ DOG

A slice o' fun!

Hangin' with Amy's cat Dooblevay!
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One of my best friends, the crazy talented Amy P, had a "dogs playing poker" themed birthday party, based on that ridiculously amazing poster from the 1980s!! So as a surprise I made her a dark chocolate cake with chocolate ganache filling and PEANUT BUTTER frosting. Extreme deliciousness alert! And... it was also vegan, as she can't eat dairy!

I tried to base the dog on the supercute little pup from the hilarious movie Best In Show. I made dog masks for Rich and I out of some leftover felt and a few spare headbands I had lying around! Et voila... maybe the scariest dog masks ever?? I tried to make them cute but really, when you cut holes out of anything and put it on your face... horror movie material!

I went for a "jaunty jazz dancer dog" look with a black and white themed outfit with white gloves... ! The last pic is of Rich and I posing with Amy's amazing fatcat Dooblevay!

Happy Birthday Amy!! Hope you have an amazing year!! xo

Smash!! Annie & Luke smash the heck out of a Coco Cake

If a tree falls in the woods and nobody hears it, does it make a sound?

If you place a cake in front of a baby, will they smash it to pieces?

This is a question I am curious about now! I made a vegan vanilla "dotty" covered cake for Erin for her sweet little twins' 1st birthday photo shoot with fantastic baby photographer Jillian Kirby. Having been an auntie three times over now and seen the nutty little things my niece and nephews do, I have certainly noticed that babies like to: poke stuff, touch stuff, throw stuff, eat stuff (even nonedible stuff)... would all babies poke and prod a cake, and end up smashing a cake?? Baby Psychology 101!

Happy Birthday Annie & Luke!

Allergic To Fish Fish Cake!

Super cute Adele from Dace (incidentally one of my favorite Vancouver clothing brands) ordered a hilarious cake for her boyfriend Ryan's birthday bash: a fish cake on a platter complete with lettuce and tomatoes, as Ryan is very allergic to the real thing! This fish cake stressed me out beyond mental reason-- I think I worried about it for two weeks straight, and could not sleep the night before the beginning of Fogerty the Fish's production, this being my very first fish cake. I drew out my design and tried to think like a little cake engineer: how would I make this large sheet cake look like a ridiculously adorable fish about to be eaten for dinner??

Thanks to my husband and jack of all trades Richie for helping me carve my fish Fogerty into a nice fish shape! And of course for helping me "lay down the roof tiling" on my little fishy's scales. You are the best RT!!!

Here is the "making of" of Fogerty the Fish. Enjoy!!

Pre-Fogerty: diagrams, diagrams help me lots.

First, a giant sheet cake! Eggless chocolate cake, with vanilla buttercream.

"The first trim is the deepest"

The second trim is much better: Rich Trawick to the rescue! Master Carver!

Delightful carved away cake, to be eaten at a later time by probably Rich Trawick

Freshly frosted once again, post-carve!

Two different colors of green fondant later, the cake is covered, with fins intact...

Much later: the finished product!! Tomatoes and lettuce, and Rich helped perfect the scales!

"Le Poisson, le poisson... Hee hee hee haw haw haw!"

Close-up of my cute little tomatoes and veined lettuce.

"Qui, moi, Fogerty??" looking sad with his gift for Ryan, the tomato topped cupcake.

Adele, hope Ryan had a great birthday party!!! Til next time blog world,

xo