I've been busy...

with this...

My one and only sweet boy starting kindergarten.

and this...

Celebrating the 1 year anniversary of Zut!

I can't believe that it's been a month since I've posted, but it has been hectic around here to say the least. With vacations and school starting and new work schedules, I feel like my life has been turned upside down and I'm just now finding my footing. The beginning of school was so hard - for me. Graham is handling it just fine, but I have been a total mess - anxious and melancholy - and having a really hard time coming to grips with the fact that my little guy is growing up so fast. Sniff, sniff...

On the other hand, restaurant life has been great. We've been slammed all summer and it's not showing signs of slowing down. I love my job and I'm so grateful to be able to do what I love, work side-by-side with my husband and have the flexibility to still be there everyday to pick Graham up from school. I really couldn't ask for more.

No more excuses though! With a wedding, a big birthday, and lots of other fun projects in the works, I will be back to posting more regularly. In the meantime, facebook & pinterest have been receiving more of my love. See you soon!

Yay - ice cream!!

What's more perfect than ice cream on a hot, summer day? Nothing if you ask me (though photographing it is another story!) I put this party together for my son's graduation from preschool and I think it was my favorite yet. The grownups were just as excited as the kids to indulge and create their favorite sundae combos.

I started with four different flavors of homemade ice cream: vanilla bean, milk chocolate, mint chip & strawberry. Sauces included bittersweet hot fudge, salted caramel, and strawberry. Cherries, candied almonds & rainbow sprinkles were offered as finishing touches. For those who preferred a cone, there were traditional cake cones and chocolate dipped sugar cones. I made ice cream sandwiches and bons bons that were delicious, but very messy and began to melt right away (if the future, I would freeze the these items for a few days to extend their non-'meltyiness'). I also baked ice cream cone cupcakes and offered root beer for root beer floats. The ice cream cone cookies in pink striped bags were given as favors to the kiddos. One of my favorite aspects of the table was the oil cloth tablecloth. It both looked cute (didn't wrinkle!!) and was extremely practical for doing little clean- ups throughout the party.

I'll be back next week to share recipes and more tips.
Many thanks to Becca of Cake. for helping out with the styling of the table and taking all of the pictures.
The incredibly talented Paige of Paiges of Style created all of the party printables and they are available for download FREE! Invitation, ice cream carton labels, toppings labels, 'thank you' tags

Sources:

Striped & polka dot ice cream cups, white wire cake stand: Sur La Table

Wooden ice cream spoons, striped bags, blue polka dot cups: Shop Sweet Lulu

Pint containers: Smart & Final

Parents Party of the Month!

I'm super excited that Graham's County Fair party was picked as Parents Magazine Party of the Month for August. Check out more pictures on Parents and get the whole story here and here. Now I've got to get busy planning this year's party!

Thanks again to Sherry Heck for capturing all of the wonderful images.

London's cake

Do you know who Zorua is? How about Zekrom? I certainly didn't until about a week ago when I was asked by Icing Smiles to make a Pokemon cake for London who was celebrating his 11th birthday. Icing Smiles is an amazing organization that  provides custom celebration cakes and other treats to families impacted by critical illness of a child. Though this type cake is definitely not my forte, I was thrilled to receive my 'call to action' and make one of London's birthday wishes come true.

Welcome to the new Cakewalk Baking!

{photo by Sherry Heck}

I'm super excited to share the new look of Cakewalk Baking. I'll be posting lots of exciting stuff this week, but I couldn't wait to share any longer. There's still a little tweaking to do, but I think it's much easier to navigate and definitely more exciting to look at. I hope you like it and would love to here your feedback.