I watched an episode of Cake Boss last night (S04E24) for the first time in a long time. I used to watch their new episodes every Monday night but I missed the last 20 weeks! How did I forget about it? Anyway! Buddy and his 3 kids were making cupcakes for his wife and his 10th wedding anniversary. Their goal was to make 1000 cupcakes and arrange them on a table that said, “Marry Us?” (sounds cheesy, but it was adorable!).

They were all at the bakery and Buddy asked his kids, “Okay guys… how do we make cupcakes? What’s the first ingredient we need?” there was a long stretch of silence and his youngest son, Marco exclaimed, “FONDANT!” Soooo adorable. Marco, and his blond hair and striking blue eyes, is my favourite

Shannon from What’s Up Whimsy sent me this a while ago and I haven’t had the chance to post it. If only I could be this creative with my styling/photography skills. I’m practising!

I’ve always been envious of people who could produce beautiful cake pops like there’s no tomorrow. I’ve had some pretty horrible experiences with them in the past. I’d be super excited at first when I’m struck by a vision/cute idea. I’d run out to the closest Bulk Barn or Michael’s and stock up on candy melts of different colours and scoop more than I need, just in case. Then I’d bake the cake, anxiously wait for them to cool, crumble the it into a bowl, vigorously mix the frosting in, mold them into perfectly-shaped cake balls and pop them in the freezer. While it is in the freezer, I’d melt the chocolate over a double boiler, being super careful not to let any steam or droplets of water get into it or the batch is DONEZO! I’d wait for the chocolate to melt, stick a lollipop stick in a cake ball and coat it in chocolate. Of course, it would be a mess and the lollipop stick isn’t white anymore but stained with whatever colour chocolate I used. It isn’t perfectly smooth but with imperfections all over the place. I’d pause, take a look at the mess and with an exasperated sigh think, “THIS ISN’T HOW IT LOOKS LIKE IN MY HEAD”. Then walk away from the messy kitchen.

I’m pretty certain that cake pops hate me. Of course practise makes perfect but I’m impatient… I want to make beautiful pops now!! So yeah… what were we talking about? Oh yes! I am envious of people and their cake popping skills.

Alllll that’s about to change, girls and boys! I finally made a successful pop tonight. Yeah, took me LONG ENOUGH! And that perfectly smooth pop? That was the 6th attempt tonight. I’m making some sample designs for a client’s birthday bash. I figure it’s about time to tackle my fear. Just like my fear of meringues, souffles and macarons (which, essentially is a meringue).

I can’t wait for the day (I’m anticipating it to be sooner than later) when I can announce, “Cake pops are now available at Sweet Escapes!”… just wait! They will also be $10 each due to the blood, sweat and tears (figuratively, except the “tears” part… ) and love that went in it. Ha-ha. I am SO going out of business @ $10/pop!

This is what I think about when I’m playing with sugar. One of the petals broke on my daisy and it reminded me of my schoolgirl days at recess when my friends and I would find wildflowers, pluck the petals out one by one and recite, “He loves me… he loves me not… ” I thought of that today… and this photo was born