Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Meet Shakira, our newest Canine Cake!

www.cakelava.com

The month of March has been absolutely whirlwind between cakes, Canada classes, the next round of classes in June 2012,  and other exciting projects in the works. We've been on a non-stop adrenaline rush since the month started and its leading right into the month of April!  If you are a follower of "Musings from Cakeland" blog, you know we recently returned from Canada where Rick was teaching 2 classes.  We left for Ontario on Sunday, March 6th.  The last cake that left our shop was in the evening of Saturday, March 5th when Rick had an opportunity to make this super cute half Chinese Sharpei, half Australian Cattle dog mix, named "Shakira". 

We were excited to make "Shakira" sculpted out of cake for our client, who has previously ordered cakes from us before and always brings us fun and interesting projects to sculpt.  How could we not fall in love with a doggie this cute.  To see this face right before we left Oahu was a wonderful goodbye!  Rick sculpted "Shakira" completely out of cake and had him relaxing in the grass.  The cake was a gift by our client for a friend of hers and she was thrilled with the cake when she saw it.  We had grown slightly attached to the dog in the process of making him and it was nice having that spirited dog energy in our shop shortly before taking off on our big adventure.  A huge thanks to our client Traci for introducing us to the loveable Shakira! 


Saturday, March 26, 2011

Classes - Next Stop, Canada - Back for More!

www. cakelava.com -- Class 2 with their clownfish cakes
The last time we blogged was a day before we flew to Kitchener, Ontario, where Rick made his teaching debut at Icing Inspirations.  It was a 9,000 mile journey round trip -- 10 hour plane ride each way -- and nearly 2 weeks away from our shop and life on Hawaii, all for the sake of sharing artistic knowledge with 37 students and meeting new friends over the course of 6 days.  Was it worth it?  Most definitely!!

It was Amazing!  Truly a fantastic experience that is hard to put into words because so many new memories were created in less than 2 weeks.  Our hosts, Chrissie and Justin of Too Nice to Slice/Icing Inspirations are truly wonderful people and took care of us, from the second we landed in Toronto, shuttling us back and forth from our hotel to the their shop where the classes were held, to meals after the classes, and regular stops at the local Tim Horton's for coffee and doughnuts.  They treated us like they were a member of their family and let us take over their lives for the duration of our visit.  Cake designer Carrie Biggers of "Carrie's Cakes" and TLC's "Ultimate Cake Off" flew up from Utah to take the class and assist Rick when needed, as did Chrissie and her assistant Kellie. Carrie is a real sweetheart in person and a wealth of knowledge on everything cake! We were so comfortable around our new friends even before the classes started.

Rick taught two 3-day "Discover Your Inner Artist" classes to a group of 17 students each.  Students learned how to make Rick's hibiscus with bamboo cake, a cakelava signature design and also a colorful sculpted clownfish in coral composition.  The classroom he taught in was incredible!  Each student had at least 4 feet of working space to themselves and their own airbrush, which definitely made for some interesting memories, if you can imagine what would happen when 17 people are using an airbrush at the same time. It brought back memories of our living in Los Angeles, except the air was a lovely green hue.

We have posted numerous photos taken during the class on our cakelava facebook page if you want to see them.  Rick loved teaching his students and the students really enjoyed learning from him and by the end of the first class, numerous people had inquired if he would be back to teach again and this continued with the second class. 

www.cakelava.com - Class 1 hibiscus cakes

Having had such an amazing experience in Kitchener, ON and a lot of positive feedback from the students and our hosts, we were ecstatic when we were invited back in 2012 to teach another course at Icing Inspirations! We started with a single 3-day class, with the cake designs as yet to be determined, to be offered in June 2012, and the class sold out in less than 48 hours, with all the spaces grabbed up by his students in the classes that just occurred.  A second class was added and we have heard that it is almost half full already! 

www.cakelava.com -- We're all SO EXCITED to come back again!

We barely got home and have spent this week getting back into our usual cake groove.  Since the next classes happened so fast, Rick hasn't had the time to finalize the cake designs he will be teaching but we can assure you, they will be just as fun as the last classes!  If you want to register for Rick's second class on June 19th, 20th and 21st, 2012 -- reminder, the first class is Sold Out -- you may contact Icing Inspirations directly.   We have included the Class information below:

Class 1 (cake design(s) to be finalized) :  June 14th, 15th, and 16th, 2012
Location:  Icing Inspirations, Kitchener, Ontario, CANADA
Status:  SOLD OUT!
You may contact Icing Inspirations directly at info@icinginspirations.ca to be placed on a wait list for either class.

Class 2 (cake design(s) to be finalized) :  June 19th, 20th and 21st, 2012
Location:  Icing Inspirations, Kitchener, Ontario, CANADA
Status:  OPEN.  Spaces going fast.
Follow this link to register.

We will make an announcement on the blog and facebook once the class projects have been finalized.

We also would like to acknowledge the ongoing requests we are receiving to have Rick teach outside of Canada.  While there may be other locations added in the future, currently Canada is our only destination, as it is logistically difficult for us to travel frequently with our schedule in Hawaii.  As other locations become available we will post them.  Icing Inspirations welcomes any students travelling from the U.S. or abroad and are happy to help with accommodation information.  Thank you to everyone who has shown their support with his classes, including our wonderful hosts Chrissie and Justin, all our students, and other cake artists!  So Excited!


Saturday, March 5, 2011

Sweet!!

www.cakelava.com
We're taking a brief hiatus on the blog while we make the trek to Ontario, Canada where Rick will be teaching a couple classes.  We are so excited to meet his students and our fabulous hosts, Chrissie and Justin! 

We couldn't leave on this wonderful journey without sharing at least one new cake, and we chose a sweets themed birthday cake that perfectly suits the celebratory spirit and happiness we are feeling.  Taylor-Marie's birthday party had a candy and sweets theme and design was left up to Rick.  Our client wanted a WOW design and something really fun and colorful.  Rick made a combination stacked and sculpted design whose colors and vibe matched the party invitation.  The cake flavors were Guava Lava and Kona Toffee Crunch.  When we brought the cake into the room, the adults eyes lit up and the children's hands started reaching out to touch the cake.  The giant cupcake on top was super cute and looked great with the rest of the design.  Happy Birthday to Taylor-Marie! 


Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Best Custom Cakes! - HONOLULU Magazine

March 2011 issue of HONOLULU Magazine. cake by Rick Reichart, cakelava, image by Rae Huo

Yesterday, cakelava celebrated 6 AMAZING years of making cakes on Oahu!  Thousands of cakes and smiles (and blood, sweat, and tears) and we can't wait to see what the future has in store for us!

Besides turning Six, we had another big reason to celebrate March 1st.  In one of our proudest moments in our cake career, cakelava was honored to receive the Editor's award for "Best Custom Cakes" by HONOLULU Magazine in their Annual "Best of Honolulu" issue.  To our knowledge it was the first time HONOLULU Magazine had this specific category.  They've had other dessert-related awards but not "Custom Cakes" and we were thrilled to have the honor!  As if that wasn't a SWEET recognition, Rick was asked to design a cake specifically for the issue that had the words "Best of HONOLULU" on it.  We knew at the time there was a possibility the cake could end up on the cover, but as with media, there are no guarantees, and all we could do was keep our fingers crossed and hope!

We were ecstatic when we found out we got the coveted cover shot for our favorite issue of the year, "Best of Honolulu"!  We knew at that moment that March was going to be completely crazy for us.  In less than a week we will be up in Canada where Rick will be teaching, and the March issue of HONOLULU Magazine was just released in stores and will be everywhere. The next couple of weeks will be hectic but exciting!

We got an advance issue of the magazine and our jaws dropped when we saw the cake on the cover in addition to a full page of Rick and I in our kitchen to introduce the "Best of Honolulu" awards.  Plus the actual award, which was a very flattering write-up about our cakes.  We're walking on clouds as we blow out our 6 birthday candles on the cake! 

Image by Rae Huo
A huge Mahalo to the Art design and Editorial staff of HONOLULU Magazine for featuring us!


Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...