Daddy's 60th Birthday!

 

 

My dad is having his milestone 60th birthday next week on September 18, and we are having an early birthday dinner for him!  Since he doesn't like sweets much, I decided to make a carrot cake that had all the fixing, raising, crushed pineapples, chopped walnuts, and coconut flakes!  Plus, he had my carrot cake before and loved it!  He is a water dragon, the same exact dragon that my baby Lily is, and this only happens every 60 years!  So this birthday is a double whammy special one for my dad because not only is he turning sixty, but he is also a new grandpa!

I look up to my dad in so many ways, and not just because he's taller than me (hehe).  He is an amazing father, and a wonderful grandfather!  He always puts everyone else front of himself, and he'll sacrifice anything for the happiness of his loved ones.  He works so hard (2 jobs) to support our family) and he never complains about it!  He inspires me to be a great person, help others, work hard, and to appreciate life.  He is the most selfless person I know, and he is the best dad anyone can ask for.  My dad really is the best!  He has a great silly sense of humor, he always has a smile on his face, and he just exudes joy and happiness.  Anyone who's met him or has been around him loves him, and would tell you the same thing.  I love you daddy, happy 60th birthday!!!  He's a picture of my dad with my daughter, his granddaughter (big dragon and little dragon, double dragon!).

Alvina's Bridal Shower

 

My best friend, Alvina, is getting married in September and I get the special honor of being Matron of Honor!  I hosted her bridal shower today and one of the things I made for her shower are her favorite Red Velvet cupcakes with Whipped-Cream Cream Cheese filling and buttercream frosting.  The decorations are all wedding related (the ring, "I Do", garter, and wedding dress) and then some Gerber daisies since she loves bright colors and happy flowers!  All the decorations are made out of fondant, and the ring has metallic pearls on top.  The Gerber daisies have some gold luster dust for some fancy pizazz.

The shower was tons of fun and it was simply wonderful to see the joy on Alvina's face!  I had a lot of fun making these sweet treats just for her, and I am glad I was able to give her a party that she will always remember!  She truly deserves to be so happy and I'm glad all her gal pals got to get together to shower her with our love!  Stay tuned in September to see part of my wedding gift to her, the Coastal theme cupcakes, cake and cupcake tower!

Lily's Baptism & 1 Month Celebration!

  

Our precious baby Lily is 5 weeks and 1 day old and she just got baptized today!  As a Vietnamese tradition, we usually celebrate the baby's 1 month old milestone, called a Ngày Đầy Tháng.  We only celebrate the baby's first month and 1 year birthday, but luckily for Lily, we will adopt the Western tradition and celebrate every year of her life as well. =).  Since I am still a new mom and in recovery, I ordered a mixed berry cake from one of my favorite bakeries, Givral Bakery.  I asked them to make a texture on the cake with a ruffle border near the bottom, it didn't quite turn out how I wanted, for instance the texture is inverted and it's fondant covered instead of buttercream, and they didn't do the ruffle border, but it's ok.  I made the peonies flowers and letter blocks spelling out Lily's name in fondant and dotted the little flowers with black food coloring.  Overall, I'm am still quite pleased with her first cake and even though I didn't bake it, I'm glad I was still about add my love to it with the decorations I made for her!

 

  

These cupcakes are French Vanilla cupcakes with Swiss Meringue Buttercream.  I actually had time to make these and the decorations as well, also made out of fondant.  I wanted to make cupcake decorations that were cute but also baby related.  So I made love birds to represent the love of her parents that create our precious angel Lily, I made a bassinet to and pacifier for the cute baby items, and the hearts that says Love and baby Lily to show her that our hearts are filled with her love and our love for her, and the pink flowers represents the pretty girl she's already growing to be!

A couple months ago near the end of my pregnancy, Khoa bought me this cool book that has a bunch of recipes and imaged of cake Push Pops, and I've been waiting for an occasion (where I have time and energy) to make these!  Although right now I don't have as much free time and energy as I use to, I still decided to try to make these.  Luckily, I was successful and made Strawberry Shortcake cake push pops!  I was going to tie a pink ribbon and add a pink rhinestone in the middle of the bow for decoration around the push pops, but I decided this was enough work!  I'll go all out for her 1 year old birthday! =P  I'm so happy to have such a cute, healthy, and strong baby, I cannot be more happy and in love with our Lily.  I hope she looks back and enjoys these sweet treats I made for her special day!

Our Baby Shower!

We had a great baby shower this weekend to celebrate the upcoming arrival of our first child, our baby dragon Lily!  One of my favorite parts of the shower was the dessert station!  The color theme was pink, light green and white, and so we made the desserts to match!

Our beautiful dessert tower set up by Chi Tu and Alvina!

I made green tea and rose macarons, and my cousin (also the host of the shower) made vanilla mini cupcakes with green tea buttercream.  I made the little fondant flower decorations to go on top of the cupcakes, and Chi Hai's cutie patootie daughter, my niece, helped place the flowers on the cupcakes, she's a natural!  Chi Hai also baked vanilla cake pops with the remaining batter from the cupcakes, and then my friend Alvina and I dipping them in pink chocolate candy melts.  Then we all added the white chocolate stripes to them. 

Our dragon lily's cake! We ordered a mixed berry cake from Givral Bakery in Westminster, CA.  I love that bakery, it's my favorite also because we used them for our wedding, and any other special occasion!  They did the light green piping along the side of the cake and added the green ribbon and bow for the border.  I made the little baby dragon and the broken green egg shell to place on top of the cake.  Khoa bought spray light pink roses that I cut up to place on the cake as well.  I am 3 weeks away from my due date, so this was one last baking and decorating gig for a very long time!  I would have made sugar flowers, but why do more work than I have to, plus, nothing looks better than the real thing!

 

 

I would like to also give special thanks to Khoa, without him, I would not have all these wonderful things in life to look forward too!  I love you baby cakes!!  We had so much and it was great to see everyone before our precious baby gets here.  We felt so much love from everyone and we are extremely blessed and lucky to have such a wonderful family.  We are so excited for what’s to come, we can’t wait to meet her!!!!!  I will now go on my official maternity leave for at least a couple months!  I'll be back in no time to make more lovely creations for all of you to enjoy!  Until then, I have a great day!!!

I Scream for Ice Cream Cake Pops!

My friends and I decided to throw a little poolside barbeque to enjoy the nice sunny California weather we've been having, and to enjoy each others' lovely company! This also gave me a chance to try out my new cake pop pans! What I really liked about the cake pop pans is that it makes the whole process of making cake pop super fast and less messy. You don't have to crumble the cake and mix it with frosting (which ends up making the cake a lot sweeter than it need to be in my opinion) and then forming the cake into round balls that's relatively the same size. With the pans, the balls are made purely from the cake batter, and then you just use the chocolate for coating, so no frosting and messiness is involved. The chocolate adds the right amount of sweetness that the frosting normally would give to a cake or cupcake. That being said, I decided to make these super fun ice cream cake pops that I've been seeing on Google images! The flavor is French Vanilla, and I used white chocolate, milk chocolate, and pink chocolate melts for the coating of the cake pops along with a variety of sprinkles. These were a big hit and I had a great time making them for all my friends to enjoy! I also made flower cake pops and smiley face cake pops that I will add in separate posts! It's been a long time that I made something just for fun, so it's times like these that really makes me enjoy my hobbies =).

Ice Cream Humor:
- What did the cake say to the ice cream? You're cool!
- The young man entered the Ice Cream Palace and asked, "What kinds of ice cream do you have?" "Vanilla, chocolate, strawberry," the girl wheezed as she spoke, patted her chest and seemed unable to continue. "Do you have laryngitis?" the young man asked sympathetically. "Nope," she whispered, "just vanilla, chocolate and strawberry."
- A man approaches an ice cream van and asks, "I'd like two scoops of chocolate ice cream, please." The girl behind the counter replied, "I'm very sorry, sir, but our delivery didn't come this morning. We're out of chocolate." "In that case," the man continued, "I'll have two scoops of chocolate ice cream." "You don't understand, sir," the girl says. "We have no chocolate." "Then just give me some chocolate," he insists. Getting angrier by the second, the girl asked, "Sir, will you spell 'van,' as in 'vanilla?'" The man spells, "V A N." "Now spell 'straw,' as in 'strawberry.'" "OK. S-T-R-A-W." "Now," the girl asked, "spell 'stink,' as in chocolate." The man hesitates, then confused, replied, "There is no stink in chocolate." "That's what I've been trying to tell you!" she screams!

Flower Cake Pops

These are flower cakes pops that I decided to recreate that I found on Google images. These are great for the spring time, mother's day, or any special or random occasion for your special someone in your life. These are French Vanilla cake pops dipped in white chocolate. The flowers are made of fondant with edible pearls in the centers with colored white chocolate for the streaks. The cherry blossoms branches are painted with black food coloring and the blossoms are piped on with pink chocolate melts.

A useful tip that I discovered while making these cake pops is that double dipping in this case is perfectly a-okay! If you find that the first coat of chocolate is too thin, and you can still see some of the cake texture showing through, wait till the chocolate dries completely, and then re-dip the cake pop into the chocolate for a second coat! This makes the coat thicker and more opaque, and it often makes it more smooth as well. Also, if you're having trouble dipping your cake pop into the chocolate (meaning the chocolate is too thick and the cake pop keeps falling off the stick), there's 2 things you can do. I always dip my stick into some chocolate, stick it halfway into the cake ball, and let it harden (dry) completely. Then you can thin the chocolate by adding non-flavoring oil (like canola oil) and this will make the dipping as lot easier. Do NOT add water, that will ruin your chocolate. I hope you all enjoy and have a blossom day!

Don't Worry, Be Happy!

I saw these cute smiley face cake pops and so I just had to make them myself! I love sending out a positive message whenever I can, and I feel that the more we absorb ourselves deeper into our busy hectic lives, the more we tend to forget the bigger picture and actually ENJOY our life! So now and then just stop and not worry too much, and try to be more happy with all the positive in your life rather than the negative. There's also opportunities to make a person's day a little brighter, so seize those moments! Now back to these cuties! These are French Vanilla cake pops dipped in white chocolate that's dyed yellow. I used black food coloring to paint in the faces and red food coloring for the tongue. Life's too short, so spend each day like your last!

Here are some happy inspirational quotes to help remind what's important:
- Most people would rather be certain they're miserable, than risk being happy. - Dr. Robert Anthony
- If you want to live a happy life, tie it to a goal, not to people or things.- Albert Einstein
- Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. - Helen Keller
- Life is relationships; the rest is just details.- Gary Smalley
- What is the meaning of life? To be happy and useful. - H.H. the Dalai Lama
- People are unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered. Love them anyway. If you do good, people may accuse you of selfish motives. Do good anyway. If you are successful, you may win false friends and true enemies. Succeed anyway. The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway. Honesty and transparency make you vulnerable. Be honest and transparent anyway. What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight. Build anyway. People who really want help may attack you if you help them. Help them anyway. Give the world the best you have and you may get hurt. Give the world your best anyway. - Mother Teresa

Oh Boy! Baby Shower!

Congratulations to Catherine and Han on their arriving baby boy, Kolin!! This baby shower's theme is Sea Critters! The octopus, blow fish, crab, sting ray, turtle and "It's a boy!" decorations are all made out of fondant. Half the cupcakes are carrot cake cupcakes with whipped cream cheese frosting and the other half are vanilla cupcakes with basic buttercream frosting! These decorations were especially fun (but also challenging) to make because this was the first time I use my new razor blade to free hand the shapes! It makes such a difference when you have a super sharp blade compared to a normal knife! There's something about the free flowing movement of the knife through the fondant that's exhilarating and scary at the same time, because if you mess up, you pretty much have to start over. However, just like with anything I do, it's all about practice! Exploring new techniques and being able to be creative keeps me going. Anyways, once again, congrats to Catherine and Han, we eagerly await the arrival of Kolin!!

To be a child is to
know the gift of living
To have a child is to
know the gift of life.
-Unknown