Hello Kitty Birthday Party!

I can't believe my little sister Kylia is turning 7! Where does the time go?! I will never forget the day she was born - for all you Seattlites you remember the BIG wind storm we had on December 14th 2006. Some people were without power for 2+ weeks. And after the storm we had a DEEP freeze. So with no power, and a brand new baby...it was pretty scary.

The Birthday Girl!

She is a total girlie girl and right now she really likes Hello Kitty. For her birthday party, I made for her friends some Hello Kitty cookies. A lot of people ask me if the cookies I make, which is piped buttercream, can be put into bags - the answer is YES! I let the dry over night and in the morning they are ready to be bagged. Now they are not as "durable" as royal frosted cookies so you do still have to be gentle.

Hello Kitty Cookies

Hello Kitty Cookies in Treat Bags

Of course we have to still sing Happy Birthday and blow out the candles, so I made her a Hello Kitty cake of course! When I asked her what kind of flavor cake she wanted (even though I knew the answer) she said CHOCOLATE! What girl DOESN'T want a chocolate cake?!

I purchased the cake pan from my local Michael's craft store. The challenge with this cake pan was I wanted to do 2 cake layers and so I was going to bake half the batter at a time. However the detail of the cake make that hard to do so I had to bake it all at once and then cut it in half. 

Hello Kitty Shaped Cake

When you are making a cake there are some general rules of thumb to follow to make the cake turn out as best as possible, but for this cake I had to throw them out the window. I actually had the bottom layer backwards so the bow was on the left instead of the right like in the picture. So I had to flip it over very swiftly and almost broke the cake in half! 

In the middle is homemade chocolate mousse which in case you didn't know, easily squishes out of the side, so don't over fill it...like I did. 

Let's just say, thank god for a crumb layer and star technique because this cake was almost an epic fail hahaha. I even had a regular round cake as back up JUST IN CASE. 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LIL SIS! I hope you liked the cake! 

Holiday Dessert Table

I am so proud of myself. I literally did 85% of my Christmas shopping not only in one day but online! Normally I am all about the adventure of going to the mall and hunting for those gifts. But if they are offering free shipping, then why not?! Basically the same thing.

This year though, I really just didn't have the time as Christmas is quickly sneaking up and I have been very busy with baking orders!

Christmas Cookies

This past week I did a dessert table for a property management company downtown Seattle. We had frosted sugar cookies in various christmas shapes, peppermint bark cake pops, brownies, and mini cupcakes in three flavors. Now for a bakery this would be down in a day, but for just one person, this took a lot of time and planning. I had to admit I was a little nervous about it since it was a pretty big order and it wasn't just my cookies. 

Christmas Wreath and Snowflake

I was all prepared for the delivery, got there earlier than they asked so I had enough time to carry everything in and set it up for them. I was thinking initially it was for a residential property management company which seemed odd to me to have a christmas party with carolers come in the middle of the day...silly me. Turns out SAFECO works in this building as well as a few other businesses - kind of a big deal. 

Santa and His Homeboy Rudolph

Luckily everything went smoothly and I got an email saying that the desserts were a hit and quickly devoured. YAY! Pat on the back for myself! I definitely felt very accomplished after this order. 

Angel and Wreath Sugar Cookies

HO HO HO

I only had friday evening to recover until I had to get started on 325 cake pops! I love cake pops. Especially how I make them and I will give you a BONUS TIP on how to make them - the secret? DON'T USE FROSTING!!! It is too sweet and you feel like you are high on sugar after, not to mention added calories. All you need to use is literally 1-2 TBLS of French Vanilla coffee creamer! YUP. Trust me. Maybe I will write a separate "how to post" on that. If you are dying to know, email me :) 

Peppermint Bark Cake Pops

I call these Peppermint Bark flavored cake pops. It is chocolate cake on the inside dipped in white chocolate and sprinkled all over with candy canes bits! YUMMY! I had some extras so I took 6 over to my parent's. My dad called me and he was like "those cake pops were so good, I ate them all! So...if you have to make anymore, feel free to bring some over." - Thanks dad!

UPDATE: 12/23/13
Adding on to the Cake Pop theme here. I just celebrated Christmas this past Saturday with my extended family. There is usually a group of about 30+ adults and I can't even count the kids anymore. Everyone brings a dish to share and I was in charge of a dessert. I thought I would mix it up and instead of brings cookies or brownies, I would bring cake pops. They are fun, easy to eat and kids LOVE them!

I typically do a swirl sprinkle design on my cake pops but I decided to come up with some other festive christmas designs that were simple to do and below is what I came up with.

Christmas Cake Pops

HO HO HO, Squiggly Christmas Tree and my Signature Swirl cake pops! - TAH DAH! OH and if you are wondering where I found that AWESOME cake pop stand - Safeway $18 - I know! I bought 3 of them. They are also dual cupcake stands as well and are clutch. 

I made about 6 dozen of them but I think I only came home with about 2 dozen. So I had some extras to take some close up photos. I am so bad about remembering to take the photos BEFORE hand. 

Ho Ho Ho Cake Pops

Vanilla Flavored Cake Pops

Merry Christmas Eve-Eve. Can't believe it is Christmas already!

Tacky Seahawk Sweaters!

OOPS! I meant to post this on Sunday during the football game but I was busy in the kitchen working on another order of cookies! hehe. One of my clients requested Seahawk themed sweater cookies for her tailgating friends! So much fun!

If you can't get enough of the legion of BOOM, check out these Seahawk themed tacky sweaters! LET'S GO SEAHAWKS!

Seahawk Themed Tacky Sweaters

Happy Holidays! If you would like to order cookies please hit the contact me button at the top for information!

Happy Holidays! More Christmas Cookies!

As I promised in my last blog post - more Christmas cookies! I threw a log on the fire, turned on the christmas music and baked the night away! And I made some NEW tacky sweaters as well. They are just too much fun to make! I hope you like them! Happy Holidays!

Frosty Snowmen

Sparkly Snowflakes

Jolly 'ol Saint Nick

Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer

New Tacky Sweaters!

Ugly Sweater

Snowman Tacky Sweater

JOY JOY JOY 

Merry Christmas!

Thanks for stopping by! If you would like to order cookies please email me!

'Tis the Season - Pull Out Your Tacky Sweaters!

I have to say I am proud of myself this year - I avoided holiday shopping this past weekend completely.   Instead I did some much needed work around the house and it was VERY productive weekend. My BF on the other hand needed some overdue R&R, which consists of beer, football and sleeping in until 10am.

Of course apart of that productivity was baking cookies, like the Starbuck's ones I posted the other day. I also started making some for the holidays too. I made a santa, elf and mitten/glove but I didn't take any pictures. Still perfecting them. The ones I REALLY liked were my "tacky sweaters" and angels. 

Tacky Sweater Cookie 1

Tacky Christmas Sweater Cookie 2

Love Them All! Which One is Your Fave?

Gotta Love Ugly Sweaters

Had to Throw in a Tacky Cardigan!

I think the Tree is Maybe My Favorite

Christmas Angels - Is It Me Or Are They Glowing?

I love the sparkly angels but I decided after the fact that I think I want to make them with faces. What do you think?

Fear not - there will be more Christmas cookies and treats through out the month. My calendar is filling up fast from cakes and cookies to cake pops for holiday parties! 

**If you want some holiday cookies for your party or for Santa's BIG night email me! If you are planning a cookie decorating party I also make cookies unfrosted for you and friends to decorate. Contact me at kaylas.career [AT] gmail [DOT] com! **

Happy Holidays!

Starbuck's Addicts Unite!

Being from Seattle, we love our coffee and we love our Starbuck's just as much. Well...I guess you either love it or hate it really...

I worked at Starbucks for over 2 years after I graduated college but I worked as a barista since I was 16 years old and working for a local coffee shop in high school. I have to say, Starbucks is one of the best companies you could work for. They really value their employees and have good benefits... and perks!

I have seen some really cute coffee/starbuck's cookies on Pinterest, but I could NOT for the life of me, find the cookie cutter shapes for sale. I am guessing the person who made the cookies knows how to make their own custom cookies cutters, which I wish I knew how to do. I did come across ONE latte cup on Etsy and purchased it.

I hope you crazy Triple Venti Non Fat, No Foam, 145 degree, 2 pump Sugar Free Hazlenut, 1 Raw Sugar Starbucks Lovers like these cookies ;)

Starbucks Logo Cookies

The Siren

Gotta Love the Red Starbucks Holiday Cups!

Happy Holidays! Email me if you would like to order some for the special Starbuck's junkie in your life hehe.

Turkey Day and Custom Cookies

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! It has been a while since I have posted on my blog but that doesn't mean I haven't been baking up a storm!

Some of my favorite baking projects have to be when I get request for custom orders. For example, Seahawks themed Halloween cookies! Again I have been bad about posting but these were for the Rams vs Seahawks game back in October that I just LOVED making! Check them out!

RIP St. Louis Rams

Owl? Seahawk? You decide

Seahawk Pumpkins!

The Ghost of Richard Sherman and Russell Wilson

All the Cookies

Vampire Fangs

Nails in the Coffin for the Rams

Another custom order I did was for a couple Pandora reps in the area. I created custom Pandora logo cookies using their App icon and paired them with Apple Cup themed cookies which the reps took to "sweet talk" some of their clients. 

Pandora Logo Cookies

Custom logo cookies

And finally, I can't forget about the 2 most important things of the weekend - Turkey Day and Apple Cup! This order was half Thanksgiving themed cookies and half Apple Cup cookies. In my last post you saw some of the turkeys I made, this time I added red in the tail feathers to give it a nice fall look to match the leaves. I really like how these ones turned out. 

Gobble Gobble!

Apple Cup and Thanksgiving Cookies

Happy Thanksgiving!

GO COUGS!

Thanks for stopping by! I hope you have a great holiday weekend! December is shaping up to be a busy cookie month all ready for me. I will try to remember to post all my creations!