Sorry to everyone for not having blogged in a while.. its been a very busy couple of months.

This weekend I went to a family BBQ and my Mum tasked me with the cake!  I wanted to do something very simple and delicious so I went with a lemon cake with lemon buttercream and a carrot cake with white chocolate buttercream.  The next decision was how to decorate them....One of my favourite blogs is by Sweetapolita.  She makes some absolutely delicious looking cakes which look stunning without having lots of fussy detail.  I was looking through the blog on Friday and I came across a post called Pastel Swirl Cake and I thought it would be a great way to decorate the two cakes for the BBQ. 

Here are my two cakes!

The first is a carrot, orange and ginger cake topped with white chocolate buttercream.  The recipe is one of Sweetapolita's which can be found in her Zingy Orange Ginger Carrot Cake blog post.  It was delicious!! a very moist carrot cake and the buttercream was divine.  I struggled to stop myself eating it all before I covered the cake.. 

To achieve this effect you mix up some buttercream and split it into three and then colour each of the batches.  I went with 2 different shades of lilac topped with a creamy white.  If you want to give this a go I recommend you have a look at Sweetapolita's blog post which includes a video tutorial explaining it very simply.  I made a few hydrangea flowers out of fondant to decorate!

My next cake was a lemon sponge with lemon buttercream.  It was supposed to be a lemon and blueberry sponge but someone forgot to add the blueberries (ummm that would be me).  Lemon cake has to be my absolute favourite cake to eat and to make.  I love the smell of fresh lemons and you get to use lots of those when making this cake.  I used my favourite lemon sponge recipe of all time by the Primrose Bakery from their book called Cupcakes.  I haven't found a lemon cake recipe to beat it yet.  The recipe can be found in one of my previous blog posts, Lemon Easter Cake.

Here are my cakes on the kitchen table at my Mum's house.  I love this cake stand and unfortunately my photo doesn't do it justice.. I bought it in a little gift shop called Alligator Pear near my Mum and Dad's in Tadworth, Surrey. 

Here are a few other cakes I have made recently..

Vintage ruffles and pink fabric flowers wedding cake made for Marion and Toby.

Parr's Priory Rowing club cake which I took to a reunion lunch with all my old rowing club friends.  The shield on the top is an edible image.

Teddy Bear cake for Laaibah age 1.

Damask ivory wedding cake for Maria and her Husband.

Mickey mouse clubhouse cake for Eesaa age 1.

Iggle Piggle cake for Morgan age 2.

Steiff teddy bear cake for my Sister Rachel.

I was also very lucky to have my Sweet 16 cake featured in Cake Central's magazine.. such an honour..

Happy baking everyone :-)