One of my wonderful birthday presents was a cupcake decorating class at Delaneys Cakes Wollongong, which I got to go to with Matt’s sister, Nicole (also wonderful gift-giver).

To start of the class we were treated to a delightful cup of tea and buttercream cupcake. You definitely can not expect to spend 4 hours making cupcakes staring at sugar, cream and icing on an empty stomach!

So we started the class learning some basic cut-outs. I must admit I am in love with this style of decoration, it is so simple but classy!

I know they say don’t try this at home but I intend to!

Next we learnt how to create these cute little creatures! While I went for the traditional dainty bird, Nikki turned hers into a punk birdy complete with a mini-Mohawk. Sorry I don’t have a picture to share, so you will have to take my word on its awesomeness.

But here’s a snap of my finished result. Really resembles Chomper chilling out on his cage, don’t you think?

We also learnt a few other cool techniques, including icing stencils, fondant flowers (these ones ARE as complicated as they look!) and fondant pattern mats.

I think I’m too scared to eat this one!

We also learnt the sweet cupcake bow. I love this as it is a cute way to say happy birthday without a tacky birthday simple. You’ve got the gift wrapping a half sorted! (And maybe one gift wrapped for the chef…)

Too good to give away, don’t you think?

Too good to give away, don’t you think?

So hope you enjoyed my eyeing off my creations half as much as I enjoyed making them! I cannot wait to get more involved in cupcake decorating, so my cupcakes look as good as they taste! I picked up a few tools of the trade so I can get baking! And a big thank you goes out to Nikki & Matt (her boyfriend, not her brother) for the cool present, Matt (the boyfriend this time!) for spoiling me in the cupcake gift shop, and to Danielle and the team at Delaneys for a fun and hands-on approach to teaching cupcake Exec orating! I would definitely recommend Delaneys as a great place to learn baking and will be returning.

Got myself a little cupcake starter kit to get creating!

The end result, I’m pretty proud of my first attempts!