Zebra Stripes & Black Diamonds

This past weekend we created these 2 cakes for two lucky ladies. The first cake was created for a little girl turning 7. Her favorite color was pink and even though she was into the whole "girly" thing, she also wanted something modern and trendy. I designed this cake with pink fondant with the bottom tier draped like a dress with zebra stripes. I added black hearts for the top tier, wrapped a bow around it with a "bling" center. Lastly, a touch of lime green was added for contrast. The other cake created this weekend was for a sweet 16 party. The birthday girl chose one of my previous designs. Since I really don't like replicating my past designs "to a T", I changed it up a bit my adding a "Queen of Hearts" topper, some fondant rolled roses and some whimsical fondant cut outs at the base of the cake. The birthday girl chose red velvet with white chocolate cream cheese filling and chocolate cake with cappuccino buttercream filling. The entire cake was iced in Italian Meringue Buttercream and covered in fondant.

A Wedding Cake Revisited

I love receiving customer feedback telling us how amazing their cake was. I created this beautiful scroll work cake for JD and Shelley for their wedding this past summer and Shelley sent me a wonderful letter expressing her gratitude. Fast forward 6 months later, and Shelly wrote on Facebook these kind words,

"The cake was perfect. I still dream about eating the delicious spice cake layers. Thank you Tara for exceeding my cake dreams!"

Resolutions: In with the New & Revisiting the Old

I know this is a bit late, but I sometimes say "Better late, than never", but I wanted to wish everyone a belated "Happy New Year!" I can't believe 2010 has come and gone. I mean, was it just me or did it fly by WAY TOO FAST? Maybe, it was just me, cause I was so darn busy cak'n. By far, 2010 was the busiest year for Just Like Gram's. The number of wedding cakes we created this year more than doubled from previous years. I also got the chance to fly to Toronto and learn the art of sugar flowers from Ron Ben-Israel. Once I got past the first day of recovering from air sickness, I really enjoyed the course. I loved meeting so many people who shared the same addiction to cakes as I did. Not only did I learn about sugar flowers, I also got the chance to learn so many little tips just from talking to other cake designers.

So, looking back at our 2010 resolutions, how did we fare?

Resolution 1) Marketing:

• This year we launched our new and updated website. I ABSOLUTELY love my new website. It so much more easier for me to maintain, plus the look is more sophisticated and elegant compared to my older more simpler version.


• We also participated in some on-line marketing on Fort St John's community website http://www.energeticcity.ca/


• plus we added a Facebook and Twitter page.


• participated in several community trade shows

Resolution 2) Delivery

• Well, I think this is going to be one of those issues that is going to be on-going for me and will never truly be resolved. Obtaining a store front is just not an option right now. Part of the reasons for this is my schedule is very eratic right now. My children moved to a new school which is in a rural area in the opposite direction from the school they used to attend. I am up at 5AM to get them ready for school and we leave at 6:45 to drive to catch their 1 1/2 hr bus ride. Combined with their after school activities, I sometimes have to pick them up at either 2:30 or 4:00 depending on the activity. So for now, I am just giving customers the option of picking up thier orders and if they want delivery, I charge a delivery fee. One exception is wedding cakes, delivery is included with all wedding cake orders within Fort St John and Taylor.

Resolution 3) Personal: Weight Loss

• This year it was my goal to try to lose some unwanted lbs. So far, I have gone down 1 size and lost 9 lbs since Sept 2010. My goal is to lose 6 more lbs. by the end of February.

So what about 2011? What plans do I have for this year?

1. Marketing still.... I plan to continue various forms of on-line advertising, plus participate in various trade shows. I recently purchased these cute sticky note pads to hand out to clients. I really loved how they turned out.

2. Blog MORE, MORE and MORE.... I am absolutely terrible for keeping up with this, so this is my resolution to attend to my blog on a regular basis.

3. Try new recipes. Last year I did so much cak'n, the last thing I wanted to do was bake for my family. Well, I got some new recipe magazines with neat cookie recipes, so I plan to try at least 1 new recipe a month.

4. Lose those last few lbs by February.

Fort St John Annual Ladies Day Out Show

This past weekend I attended the annual Ladies Day Out show in Fort St John. I have attended it for the past 4 years and every year it seems to get better and better with more people coming out to see local business' in the community. I prepared over 400 cake samples and they were all gone by the last hour of the show.

Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of my booth, because I forgot my camera. On this one occasion my husband was supposed to meet me and help me set up, so he was going to bring my camera. When I got to the venue, he phoned me to tell me that our son was sick with a 24hr flu, so I had to set up on my own. When I got home after the show I took some pictures of a few of the cakes that were on display.

Unlike bridal shows, I do an assortment of display cakes for people to see, because a lot of the people who come to these shows are moms, grandmas and aunts.

Baby Shower cake in pastel colors complete with modeled baby animals.

Now when I go to these shows I always ask my kids for ideas for cakes for boys and girls. My son who is in Taekwando asked me to make a taekwando cake. So I grabbed his uniform and used it for inspiration. Here is his Taekwando shirt complete with belt and tips.

I designed this cake over 3 years ago based on my own wedding dress design. My wedding dress was white cotton eyelet over baby blue satin. I have taken this cake to several trade shows over the years and I was about ready to retire it, but it seems every time the response is overwhelmingly positive. PEOPLE LOVE THIS CAKE! Hmmm, maybe I will keep it around for a while longer.

Sometimes when you come up with a design and you think it is SUPER, yet you get the oddest or more like, LACK of response from people, then you think hmm, maybe the design was so great after all. THEN, on the other hand, you do a design that you think is "way out there" and people love it. This was the story of the KISSING COUPLE design. I thought of this cute idea of putting red lips all over a cake with a heart and silhouette of a couple kissing on top. Neat idea, right? Let me tell you that cake was so frustrating. Working with red icing is totally non-negotiable when it comes to errors. THERE is no room for making a mistake. You screw up and it is very hard to remove that red stain. It was very frustrating and time consuming to stencil all those lips and then brush them to add some texture. I wasn't too sure on the final outcome, but at the show it was ONE of THE most popular cakes at my booth.

Lastly, for all you winter brides out there, I designed this Silver Snowflake wedding cake. The outer layer of each tier was embossed with a snowflake stamp and then I created gumpaste snowflakes which were dusted with silver too.

Christmas Baking Anyone?

Can you believe it's only 8 weeks until Christmas? Before you know it, the holidays will be here and you will be rushing around getting your Christmas shopping done. What about all your Christmas baking? Can't be bothered or don't have time? Just Like Gram's offers Christmas baking packages suited for a variety of budgets. So, beat the rush and book your Christmas baking today!

Each package contains the following:
Butter Tarts, Christmas Sugar Cookies, Gingerbread Men, Chocolate Tartlets, Shortbread Snowflakes, Chocolate Dipped Pretzel Rods, Raspberry Ribbon Cookies, Chocolate Truffles, Chocolate Dipped Brownie Bites, Christmas Butter Cookies, Chocolate Dipped Almond Logs, Almond Cranberry Bark, Homemade Marshmallow Whoopie Pies

Select a Package that is JUST right for YOU!
1) Just A Nibble $35.00 - a random assortment of 2 dozen treats
2) Family's Coming $85.00 - receive half-dozen of each treat
3) Tis' the Season to Celebrate $175.00 - one dozen of each goody

Also Available: Beautifully hand decorated Christmas Sugar Cookies & Christmas Chocolate Caramel Dipped Apples. We can even package them individually! Just the perfect Christmas party favour!

Dates Available for Pick up: Dec 3, Dec 11, Dec 18 and Dec 21.

A Sweet 16 Birthday

I received an email from a client over a month ago requesting a cake for her daughter's upcoming 16th birthday. She wanted something girly yet pink and fashionable. I suggested going with either polka dots or zebra print. We finally settled on the colors of pink and black with the top tier pink with black polka dots and the bottom tier pink with black zebra stripes. I added the bow with a sugarpaste brooch. We also added some whimsical pink sugarpaste roses sprinkled with black disco dust on top surrounding the 16. I also added some edible diamonds for some additional bling.
I received a lovely phone call from the mom a couple of hours after I delivered it. She said she loved the cake and thought it was absolutely beautiful. She also commented she didn't know how she was going to serve it since she felt it was too lovely to cut.

He Shoots! He Scores!

Yes, I know there what you're thinking... "what's going on, you haven't posted anything in eons?" Yes, you are right, I haven't and I have no excuses. Life was so hectic this summer with wedding cakes, plus the normal business of birthdays. This summer was the busiest it has even been. We did more wedding cakes than ever before. So, now that wedding season has died down a bit, I have been just kinda playing a bit lazy and doing the mom/wife thing. Baking for my kids, taking them to their after school functions and spending time with my hubby doing our favorite pastime - "hunting". AND, yes, I am still doing cakes, but wedding season has slowed down so I have had a bit more time to breathe.

Here was recent order we did this past week. I love when I get calls from repeat customers wanting to order again and rave about our cakes. This customer ordered cupcakes and cake for her 3 year old son's birthday. The theme was tractors and hockey. Way to go, Canucks!

Tractor cupcakes were white with strawberry filling iced in traditional buttercream. Hockey stick cupcakes were decorated with fondant hockey sticks and pucks. These were vanilla filled with Boston cream pie filling and iced in traditional buttercream.

These cupcakes featured the hockey jersey of the Vancouver Canucks hockey team. One of my favorite flavours were vanilla with raspberry cheesecake filling iced in traditional buttercream.

For the birthday boy's cake, she chose a design featuring the Vancouver Canuck's logo complete with hockey puck, stick and skates. Cake flavour was red velvet (their favorite) with cream cheese filling, iced in traditional buttercream and covered in fondant.