I had the pleasure of creating desserts for one of my best friend’s daughter’s 1st birthday party. The party theme was “Bright as the sun, our sweet little Finley is turning one”. The party was absolutely darling, so many cute colors, patterns, details, and of course all love in the world for Miss Finley.

Happy 1st Birthday sweet girl!

In July I had the pleasure of creating Tiffani Thiessen’s daughter Harper’s 2nd birthday dessert table. Tiffani may have played the scandalous role of Val on 90210 and every boy’s dream as Kelli Kapowski on Saved By the Bell, but in real life she is just as sweet as can be.

Tiffani told me one of Harper’s first words was “bird” so they chose a bird theme for her 2nd birthday. I instantly fell in love with the theme, the colors, and the incredible invitation her sister in law Jill of Jill Smith Design created for Harper. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, the invitation sets the stage for the party. Jill absolutely nailed it with her beautiful invite of birds, birdcages and amazing colorful fonts printed on wood. The minute I saw the invitation I was thrilled to create a coordinating dessert table.

For Harper’s table, I decided to make 5 different textured buttercream cakes in the colors from her invite. Guests enjoyed the variety of cake in addition to cake pops, cupcakes and sugar cookies baked in the custom made bird cutters similar to the bird on the invitation. Desserts were set atop wood tree rounds and stump pedestals, along with colorful glass cake plates. We put the table in front of Tiffani’s gorgeous glass doors and hung scattered birdcages above the table.

The party was amazing. Not only was Tiffani an absolute dream client to work for with her prompt replies and easy going personality, but her family and friends were incredible as well. The love of family was so prominent I could have moved to California just to make new friends with them.

Thank you Tiffani for including me in sweet Harper’s 2nd birthday. Can’t wait for her 3rd birthday!

My sweet little Ally is now a Kindergarten graduate.  I can hardly stand to think of her being away from me next year in full day first grade.  I had a hard enough time sending her to kindergarten 5 days a week!

But what an exciting year she had.  I can’t believe how much she has learned in just 9 short months.  She learned to read, write, spell, add and subtract, and most important, learned even more about Jesus.  Every week at Northshore Christian Academy she was given a new bead to add to her “bible necklace” if she had memorized the weekly bible verse.  Her little necklace is filled with colorful beads!  We are so proud of our girl, she is truly one of the sweetest, most caring little girls you’ll ever meet.

To celebrate her accomplishments we threw her a pink ombre themed graduation party.  All things pink! My incredibly talented photographer friend Kaylee of Kaylee Eylander Photography captured all the details of the day, from the grad hat cookies, diploma topped cupcakes, to the inside of a pink ombre ruffle cake.  We snacked on diploma tortilla wraps tied in pink bows and sipped pink lemonade, while the kids filled their goodie bags with as much pink candy as their pink polka dot bags would hold.

Guests were sent home with pink ombre cakes in a jar, topped with paper grad hats complete with yarn tassels! And Ally didn’t leave the party empty handed, we gave her a new iPod engraved with her graduation year.  2024.  Eek.  I can’t even fatham that.

Congratulations Ally James!  We are so proud of you!

It’s all about ombre’ this season. Not only can we wear it as our hairstyle, nails and fashion, we can ombre’ in buttercream as well! Loving this ruffle ombre cake and 1st birthday smash cake. Even cookies can look great in ombre’ colors.

A week after I flew down to do Simone’s 1st Birthday, it was time to celebrate Stella’s 3rd Birthday, Hello Kitty style! To be honest, I’ve never been much of a Hello Kitty fan. In fact when Tori first told me the theme I cringed a little. Character parties are not my favorite. One, because you don’t want your event to look like you robbed your local party store, and two, because it’s hard to nail a licensed character in buttercream! But hey, I’m always up for a challenge.

To keep the dessert table looking Hello Kitty AND chic at the same time, I created Hello Kitty’s Bake Shop. Lucky for me, I happen to know the most incredibly talented seamstress who was able to whip up an adorable pink and white striped awning, to mimic an old fashioned bakery. I added Hello Kitty’s signature bow to many of the desserts including the white ruffle cake, coconut topped cupcakes, banana bread bites, and even attached mini bows to the dessert name tags. Gorgeous white milk glass cake plates and compotes were used to display all of the bake shop goodies. Suddenly, as I finished dessert after dessert, little miss Hello Kitty started growing on me. And after I conquered her signature face in a cake pop and sugar cookie, I decided I kinda liked her!

By the time the awning was hung, the cake plates were placed, and each dessert was set up and ready for the party, I realized Hello Kitty might be cute after all. Not just cute, She was adorable!

As pleased as I was with how the dessert table turned out, the best part of this birthday was that I had my daughter Ally with me! Tori had invited my family to come, but I decided to make it a special trip with just Ally and I. She was such a good girl while I was working, making friends with Liam and Stella, and enjoying all Tori and Dean’s animals. When it was finally party time, she jumped in the bouncy house, was given a manicure and feather extensions, had Cinderella painted on her arm, and ate way too much sugar. And as if the party wasn’t enough excitement, afterwards we headed to The Grove in LA to shop and dine at American Girl.

Thanks Tori and my favorite little Stella McDermott for inviting me to make all the sweets at your 3rd birthday party!! Hugs!

Going back and forth last year working with Tori on her new book, I quickly became friends with Tori’s friends Scout Masterson and Bill Horn(AKA the Guncles). They adopted a gorgeous baby girl, Simone Lynn, back in 2010. I was fortunate meet Simone when she was still a tiny baby at Tori’s Back to School party in August of that year.

Time flew and suddenly it was time to start plannning Simone’s 1st Birthday. Scout called to see if I’d be up for creating Simone’s 1st Birthday cake and dessert table. As soon as he told me the theme and venue, I was more than happy to say YES! Modern Circus at the Santa Monica Pier Carousel? Cutest venue ever!! Plus of course, Scout just happens to be one of the sweetest, most genuine people I’ve ever met. Love him!

I loved this table for so many reasons. I bounced ideas off of Scout and he was happy to let me just go for it. That’s the best. I chose a round table since the venue had an amazing rounded out corner, covered in windows. Guests could then walk around the table and eat sugar from every angle! Above the table I put together a giant cluster of pink tissue poms and paper lanterns. The table was covered in pink linens, vintage pink cake plates and compotes, and overflowing with a multitude of pink desserts. Cake lollipops, cotton candy topped cupcakes, sugar cookies shaped in circus foods, caramel apples, and gobs of perfectly colored pink candies. The two tiered pink cake was topped with a gold carousel and horses decorated with fondant. Scout did have one request, he wanted a smash cake for Simone shaped like a circus tent. Done! She dug into that thing like a pro!

The party was wonderful, from the gorgeous flowers to the adorable Sweet Lucie’s ice cream cart, and of course the most beautiful vintage carousel and Santa Monica boardwalk as a backdrop. If I lived in Ca, I’d definitely be booking a party there!

Thank you again Bill and Scout for letting me be part of such a special day! Already looking forward to sweet Simone’s 2nd birthday! xoxo!

A few weeks ago I was invited to create desserts for October’s Girl Power Hour event in Seattle. It was held at the most darling salon, Swink Style Bar in University Village. The theme was Breast Cancer Awareness, which means PINK to me! Everything was pink, pink drinks, pink food, pink clothes, pink treats, even pink tassel extensions being put into hair!