Cave Creek Craft Fair This Weekend

Please join Simply Sweets' this Saturday for Lone Mountain Elementary's (Cave Creek) Holiday Craft Fair where we will join over 50 vendors selling holiday gifts. We will have an assortment of chocolate gifts, candy, Jesse Steele aprons, holiday sprinkles, and cupcakes for sale. Our friends from Two Sisters Jewelry Boutique will also be there so make sure you check out their gorgeous designs.

Gift ideas, stocking stuffers and entertaining

We've got some great ideas for gifts, stocking stuffers and entertaining - visit the specials section of our blog to see the complete list!

Also, don't forget to vote in our carrot cake poll on the right side of our blog.

Simply Sweets wishes you a Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to our customers, friends, family and blog readers! We hope everyone enjoyed their day filled with family and yummy food.

We spent the day with my husband's family and we brought some desserts to add to the Thanksgiving buffet. Chocolate dipped fall themed pretzels, carrot cake cupcakes topped with fall sprinkles and turkey chocolate suckers for the kids.

The carrot cupcakes with cream cheese icing were new for me and they were such a hit that we're thinking of adding them (as a cupcake only) to the menu when we open in our new location next year. These were made for my husband so they were pure carrot cake - after reviewing several carrot cake recipes many include add-ins such as raisins, pecans, pineapples and coconut (on the cream cheese icing). What's your preference? Please vote in our poll (right column of our blog)!

Pink Baptism Cake

We created this cake for a baby girl's christening celebration. This cake was inspired by the Baby Victor cake that I did several year's ago for a neighbor's son. The cake is iced with pink buttercream and the top is done in a white corneli lace pattern. The cross on top is made from white chocolate tinted pink and dusted for a pearl shine. The baby shoes are made from fondant and also dusted with pearl. The message on the front is done with an edible image and outlines with a buttercream bead border.

Cherry Blossom themed 40th Anniversary Cake

We created this cake and cupcake combination for the 40th anniversary celebration for one of our good customers. The party theme was Asian with cherry blossom decorations and several shades of pink. The cake and cupcakes were iced in pink buttercream and topped with cherry blossom branches made from fondant. For favors we created pink chocolate dipped fortune cookies.

18th Birthday Nautical Themed Birthday Cake

This cake was created for an 18th birthday celebration - this party was held on a boat on Lake Powell so they went with a nautical theme in the colors of blue and silver.

Merry Market Photos

This past Saturday we participated in Merry Market, a holiday boutique benefitting the AZ Coalition Against Domestic Violence. The event was held at Meridian Bank near Scottsdale Promenade. We provided mini cupcakes for the food buffet - double chocolate sourcream and white sourcream topped with Christmas trees and holly leaves. We also had a table with some Thanksgiving goodies available for sale including boxes of cupcakes, chocolate dipped pretzels (always a big seller!), mocha latte crunch and turkey chocolate suckers. In addition we had one of our latest products, Jesse Steele Aprons, available for sale. We were joined by some other popular vendors including Mary Kay, Discovery Toys, Silpada Jewelry, and Cabi clothing.

5th Birthday Princess Tiara Cake

This is a repeat design of the Princess Brooke Tiara Birthday Cake - so popular with young girls!

Simply Sweets' Sassy Circles Baby Shower Cake with Booties

Our Sassy Circles design is very popular for baby shower cakes and most of customers select a pair of baby booties for the topper - or in this case 2 pairs for twins. The first cake was for a set of baby girl twins and the cake is done in several shades of pink and white. The second cake was for a baby girl and done in pink, brown and green.

2nd Birthday Glitter Cupcakes with Gerber Daisies

This cupcake tower was a created for a 2nd birthday. The cupcakes are topped with crystal sugar to make them glittery! One cupcakes is topped with a 2 and the rest of the cupcakes are topped with Gerber daisies. The cupcakes were displayed on a cupcake stand that holds 18 cupcakes - we have several smaller towers available for rent in addition to the larger towers.

These cupcakes were inspired by the CupKate 1st Birthday Cupcake Tower

Join Us for Merry Market 2009 and Support AZ Coalition Against Domestic Violence

The Pioneer Woman Comes to Tempe, Arizona

Ree Drummond, the Pioneer Woman, came to Tempe, Arizona last Thursday evening for a book signing at Changing Hands bookstore. As a blogger and cookbook collecter (I have several 100) I was excited to attend her book signing. And it turns out, she has many other local fans too - there were hundreds of people there. Some were huge fans who have every detail about her family memorized from reading her blog. If for some reason you've never heard of her you must check out her blog - but how could you not have heard of her? Time Magazine named her blog as one of the best 25 blogs for 2009 and she has over 33,000 followers on Twitter.

If you haven't yet checked out her book, The Pioneer Woman Cooks, you must. The recipes sound so delicious and every detail is explained and illustrated. The book also is full of many interesting stories and photos of her life and family on the ranch and is a great book to just sit down and read. For some great reviews, check out Bakerella and RecipeGirl. I have so many recipes marked to try - tonight, in fact, for dinner my family enjoyed PW's Cream Mashed Potatoes - very rich and creamy!

The event start at 7 pm and she started with a short speech and then answered questions from the audience. With hundreds in attendance, the seats were full and the rest of us crowded along the isles of the book store trying to get a glance as she spoke.

Once she was finished, the book singing began with group A and those with babies and children. The first group took at least an hour but after that it move a little faster. I was group M and had the chance to meet Ree Drummond around 1130 pm - it was worth the wait! She is just so sweet and this was after signing hundreds of books with still more to go. I don't think she left until after midnight. She also brought along her sister-in-law, Missy, and Mother-in-law who were also signing books.

While there I met Shealyn of SheyB. She makes really fun and sassy camera straps - I have a turquoise and brown damask one and people are always stopping me to ask where I got it. And best of all, while she sells her products through etsy.com, she is a local based in Phoenix. She brought two of her gorgeous camera straps as a gift for Ree Drummond.

Stayed tuned for a great give away to be announced this week - bigger and better than any we've done before and this one is open to anyone in the US, not just the Phoenix-metro area...

editing to add, Ree Drummond has blogged about her book signing tour last week including her stop in Phoenix

Happy Anniversary

My husband and I celebrated our 6th wedding anniversary this weekend. As a gift, I made him some cupcakes - his favorite Simply Sweets flavor is white sourcream with American buttercream. The cupcakes are topped with a red fondant circle embossed with XOXOX.

Pink and Green Polka Dots for a 9th Birthday { Children's Birthday Cakes }

We created this very girly cake for a 9th birthday celebration - 2 tiers iced in light pink and covered with bright pink and lime green polka dots, a funky ball borders, daisies and a bow. We delivered this cake to a residence in Paradise Valley.

Inspiration Cakes:

3D Purple Purse Cake for a 40th Birthday Celebration

We created this 3D purse cake for a few women celebrating their friend's 40th birthday. The purse was done in her favorite color - purple! The cake is white sourcream cake, strawberry mousse filling and iced with fondant. We delivered this cake to a residence in Paradise Valley.

We also created milk chocolate high heel shoe party favors for everyone to take home.

Some past purse cakes that we've created:

30th Birthday Sports Themed Cake

We created this 30th birthday cake for a huge sports fan - he's both a player and fan of many sports including golf, football, basketball and tennis. The cake was done in gold and maroon for his favorite college's team colors- Arizona State University (ASU).