Scooby, Scooby Doo, Where Are You?

I had the pleasure of helping my good friend Joanna Park of Floral Sense plan a a little boys' Scooby-Doo birthday party. Her vision of bright blues and greens are so fun to work with, especially when it comes to decorations and the dessert table.

Joanna was super creative when planning this event and came with clever treats for the dessert table.

I created mini chocolate cupcakes... perfect size for snacking!

Joanna had some delicious meaty treats, but this beef jerky are for humans, not dogs!

I created simple white-chocolate covered Oreo cookie pops in blue to match the theme. Joanna came up with the clever idea of presenting them in delicate white tins filled with blue and green Fruit Loop cereals!

Also available were these deliciously cute mini donuts by Dough-a-Deer.

Scooby Snacks!

I experimented by adding a little twist with chocolate-covered Rice Krispies pops!

So happy these turned out well... and they taste great too!

And the centerpiece of it all.... the birthday boy's Scooby-Doo cake!

Joanna provided more pictures and details from this adorable and creative event on her Floral Sense blog.

Photos courtesy of the fabulous D.Park Photography team

Mini cupcakes: chocolate cake with whipped vanilla frosting and blue and green sanding sugars

Chocolate Rice Krispies pops: tinted white chocolate covered Rice Krispies cereal in melted marshmallows; covered with blue and green sanding sugars

Chocolate Oreo cookie pops: tinted white chocolate over double-stuffed Oreo cookies

Cake: top tier- chocolate cake with whipped vanilla frosting and covered in tinted fondant; bottom tier- yellow cake with whipped vanilla frosting and covered in tinted fondant; cake decor are made from fondant and piped with whipped vanilla frosting; Scooby-Doo candle was store bought

Simple Tae Kwon Do Cupcakes

My dad is a Master instructor at Tom Vo's Tae Kwon Do Academy and they do monthly birthday celebrations for their students. My dad's birthday was in February and he wanted to bring something for all of his students during his birthday month. Too bad he told me the night before the event if I can whip up come cupcakes for him.

With just a few hours to create, no supplies, and no time to prep or design, I whipped up some simple and messy Tae Kwon Do cupcakes for my dad and his students.

Baked48 cupcakes, 24 rainbow yellow cake and 24 chocolate cupcakes. I was lucky to have some ready-made frosting to tint and use. Notice the movie on the right? My favorite movie ever, Con Air. I always put on a movie to listen to when I am baking and decorating.

I decided to make the cupcakes look like karate uniforms since Tae Kwon Do uniform aren't as recognizable in cupcake form (instead of the "Y" neckline, it is a "V" neckline). Because I was short on time, I stuck to two colors: red and black. If I had more time, I would made each cupcake with a different color belt. Luckily the TKD uniforms are white so that saved me some time.

The cupcakes look pretty decent after they were all boxed up and ready to go. It can be such a pain to try to quickly whip up sometimes with little or no warning, but I always have fun doing so. Always a learning experience, too!!

Happy birthday to my Papa!!! I love you very much!

M.I.A.

Hey everybody!

I am so sorry I've gone missing for awhile. Life has been really busy and I have not had a chance to update this as much as I want. Please forgive me.

When I do find the time to sit down and update, I will include some scrappy, last minute Tae Kwon Do cupcakes I made for my dad, a fun colored Scooby-Doo cake, some scrapbook pages I've finally finished, and something called vinylmations.

Thank you for continuing to check on my blog! Fun stuff to come, I promise!

xoxo

Yo-Gabba-Gabba, Yo-Gabba-Gabba!

Happy 1st Birthday, Miss Aubrey!

The entire cake and cupcakes took over 20 hours to do. I must be a slower worker because these are generally simple cupcakes.

So my friend Nicole's daughter's first birthday was earlier this month and she asked if I would create the cake and cupcakes for the party! I was so honored that she asked and told her I would love to! Nicole and her daughter, Aubrey are currently in love with this children television show called Yo Gabba Gabba. Yo who??? That was my first reaction. Apparently, Yo Gabba Gabba is a huge hit among babies, toddlers, and young kids these days. The new Sesame Streets. Or the new Barney.

Because I was unfamiliar with this show and the characters, I had to do plenty of research to see what colors, designs, and themes I can use for my creation. I even forced myself to watch an episode or two.

(The main characters of the show, minus DJ Lance-something.)

Nicole asked for simple white cake, but Lisa does not so simple! For the cake, I decided to make a two-tier funfetti cake, which is white cake with sprinkles mixed in. I used white vanilla whipped frosting to layer the cakes. Fondant was used to color and decorate the cake! I tried to write Aubrey's name on the cake, but of course I can't keep it straight!

(The bottom tier of the funfetti cake.)

(This HUGE hunk of white fondant was dyed blue and enough to cover both the bottom tier and top tier of the cake. That is a lot of fondant for Little Lisa to work with! Talk about an arm and hand work out!)

(Bottom tier covered with whipped frosting and fondant. I added the fondant Yo Gabba Gabba characters. Did you notice the yellow Wall-e looking guy is upside down? I didn't... not until a few hours before the party. Yikes!)

(Added the second fondant-covered tier to my cake! Luckily I didn't need to use any dowels to hold up the second tier.)

(Threw in some simple blue and yellow dots in various sizes to add more fun to the cake.)

(Add some green borders, flower dots, and Aubrey's name, which is orange for DJ Lance Rock, and ta-da! Also flipped poor yellow Wall-e/Johnny Five over.)

For the cupcakes, I tinted white cake in multicolors and made rainbow cakes to match the bright colors of Yo Gabba Gabba. The cupcakes are covered with tinted buttercream frosting and some have fondant decor pieces.

(The rainbow cupcakes look so fun!)

(Getting the eyes, flowers, and other fondant detail pieces ready.)

(I love my Yo Gabba Gabba cupcakes!!!)

(The inside of the cupcakes are so fun to look at! Everybody was really surprised!)

(Cake and cupcakes together! All done!)

Happy 1st Birthday, Miss Aubrey!

I love my little Aubrey. I was there with her mommy to listen to her first heartbeat, was there when her mommy was in labor, and was there to witness her come into the world. I can't believe it's been a year already. Such a beautiful, emotional day. Little Aubrey was diagnosed with Down Syndrome and because I had some experience with individuals with Down Syndrome, I knew I was meant to be in this child's life. I love her and her mommy dearly and watching her grow has been an amazing experience. Auntie Lisa will always be here for you!

I love you, Nicole and Aubrey!

Cake: two-tiered, four-layered white cake with multi-colored sprinkles (funfetti cake creation); cake is covered with whipped white vanilla frosting and covered with tinted fondant. Decorated with fondant pieces, edible ink, and buttercream frosting.

Cupcakes: white cake tinted with multi-colored food gels for rainbow effect; topped with tinted buttercream frosting and and fondant decor pieces

Some Fun with my Nails

I love color! When I plan my outfits, I try to add some color because neutral colors seems boring to me. Sometimes I wear too many colors, which can be a problem! Haha! Besides my clothes, I love adding color through my accessories (handbags, shoes, scarves, hair accessories, etc...) and my new side hobby is nail art!

Growing up, my mom, my sister, and I would always keep our toenails painted. It was a fun girly thing to do in the family. To this day, I cannot stand it when my toenails are bare. I need some color to keep them from looking for naked.

I love buying nail polish! Although I love the expensive bottles ($4+), I tend to buy the cheap ones so I can have more colors for more variety. Plus, nail polish dries out really quick so there is no need to buy expensive brands.

I am warning you that I have ugly feet so shield your eyes if necessary.

(Watermelon-inspired toes for my SF trip)

(Black with white polka-dots to match my bikini. First time attempting dots.)

I am not a fan of getting a manicure or pedicure. I have received manicures less than five times in my life and a pedicure just once. Never had acrylics before either because my nails are pretty strong and don't break/split. Sure the massage part is nice, but I hate the feeling of my nails being files and my cuticles are under control so I can never justify paying someone to do it. Doing it myself is just so much cheaper! Don't get me started on pedicures... those are way too easy to do!

(Friend's birthday manicure date. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE the way my nails look after a professional manicure. They look so classy and polish. Sadly, my nails grow really fast and since they are my natural nails, the oils make them prone to chipping.)

With the rise of YouTube and my cousin Nancy, I found that simple nail details can be done at home with tools such as band-aid, tape, toothpicks, and dull wooden pencils. I decided to attempt some simple designs just to see if I can do it. You see, my hands are not very steady and I was never careful with details. Heck, even painting my right hand is a difficult task! So right now, I'll just stick to simple dots and lines.

(Purple and gold! For Masters graduation and Lakers Championship 2010)

(Red with glitter and white stripes for Christmas)

(Minnie Mouse-inspired nails)

*I never planned on blogging about my nails so I don't have many pictures. Bet you noticed a lot of red... I like how red shows up in pictures and since it's my favorite color, I always choose red when I'm bored. I'll update with more colors later!

One day, I noticed my friend Katie, who always wears nail polish too, with the coolest nail designs! When I askd her about them, she told me they were these special nail polish stickers that are available at Sephora, but they are quite pricey. A few days later, while shopping with some friends at the Louis Vuitton Store inside Bloomingdale's at South Coast Plaza, my friend Amy and I notice our salesgirl's super cute nails cheetah print nails. Turns out they were also the special nail polish stickers, but she bought some at CVS for a much lower cost! Super excitied, Amy and I ventured to many drugstores in search for these Sally Hansen Salon Effects nail polish stickers and found some at a local Walgreens, where we received a demonstration, samples, coupons, and a buy one, get one half off deal.

(So many cute designs to choose from! I settled for the lace although I might go back for zebra or cheetah designs.)

(Super easy to use and they last for about a week before chipping. They took about an hour to apply, but I'm sure with practice I can get them on quicker. I love them!)

Apparently these "nail designs" or "nail fashion" are the latest trend when it comes to nail art. (That and something called nail gels, but that's more along the lines of acrylics so I don't know much about it.) The first company to introduce this is Minx Nails and the designs offered through them are AMAZING!

Let me know what you think of the latest nail trends!