A lovely day in the Bay!

A couple of weeks ago, I travelled ot the Bay of Plenty for a friend's daughter's wedding. Olivia & Mark were married on a beautiful sunny Saturday and their wedding reception was held at the award winning Charthouse

I had the pleasure of being asked to help with the candy buffet and cupcakes. As I couldn't fly down until Friday, I didn't have enough time for the wedding cake as well (above), this was entrusted to the lovely Sondra from Sweet Bites Cakes I spent Saturday morning at the Charthouse. From their lovely views, to their amazing staff and service, I can see why they continue to win awards. Check out these views out the window.

In total I made 300 cupcakes, but with only an afternoon and evening to do them, I had to work as fast as my hands could move. I take my hat off to those of you that do this for a living it is no easy task! Special thanks go to the Bride's stepfather Chris, who worked tirelessly with me all evening (until 12.07am) putting together laser cut wrappers and stacking the finished creations

I utilised some of my silicone moulds, and the balls you see on the cupcakes are 4mm black sugar pearls, 7mm candy beads and 10mm sixlets, to which I rolled in my hands, which were smeared with crisco - then I rolled them in white holographic glitter (it looks green in the photo, but I promise you it's white hologram). I also used impession mats to create patterned fondant and used a variety of cutters, to cut out shapes from black fondant and white gumpaste.

I was quite pleased how these turned out, given the limited time I had to do them.

The candy buffet jars & vessels were collected by the bride's mother. She made the signs and allotted which candy went in which jar. I was in charge of bringing the tongs, scoops & ladles from Kiwicakes.

I especially like how she used pearlized white jimmies sprinkles to hold up the black licorice twists

My seat during the recption was right next to the candy buffet, as I was on refill duty. I really wished we'd had a candid camera turned on the buffet. It was priceless watching people faces as they studied the candy. Many stole some and ate it, as they made their selections. Other were very well behaved. The ones that had me chuckling were the people who put too much in their take home jars and then couldn't get the lid clamped down. But it sure was fun!