New Faux Cupcakes Up on Etsy

I have posted some new faux cupcakes on my ETSY shop.

These cupcakes are PRE-ORDER, and will be shipped on OCT 5, 2011.

Each design/flavor is of limited quantity ...so check out my shop now, and get your faux cupcake! :D

These are just some of the new ones. More faux cupcakes on my shop!

PRE-ORDER!

Will ship on Oct. 5, 2011

Miniature Cupcakes (Work In Progress)

If it's not that obvious ...yes, I'm obsessed with cupcakes. I'm currently working on miniature cupcakes both in 1:12 and 1:6 scale.

Here are some work-in-progress pics. I haven't iced them yet, though. I'm waiting for some miniatures plates that I ordered online. It's been over three weeks now since I purchased those plates, and I haven't received them yet. I'm crossing my fingers that they're just delayed (...super delayed) and not lost! :p

1:6 scale W.I.P.

1:6 scale W.I.P.

1:12 scale W.I.P

bottom diameter: 5mm top diameter: 7mm height: approx 4mm - 5mm

1:12 scale W.I.P

bottom diameter: 5mm top diameter: 7mm height: approx 4mm - 5mm

Wonderful Surprises From a Wonderful Friend

Selling on Etsy did not just earned me extra cash, but I did get a lot of friends, too! Though miles away from me they do keep in touch, sending me their well wishes through emails and convos.

One of them is Marie Christine from France. She's been a good friend ever since our first Etsy transaction. She even surprised me one day, when I got this lovely cookbook from France in the mail.

And last Thursday, I received yet a nother surprise from her! My son and I were very thrilled when we got the package. It felt like Christmas opening the package....just loads of goodies inside. French biscuits, trinkets, postcards and whole lot more! I will definitely cherish all these wonderful items!

Thank you, Marie Christine...you definitely made my day! :)

Our Stolen Photos Completely Removed on this eBay Shop! Yay!

As I checked this eBay shop just moments ago, all the stolen photos of faux cupcakes were completely removed. I believed that the original owners have taken action, reporting this violation as well.

I find it weird (and funny, and irritating!) that this seller, after removing my photos, would still have the guts to continue to use other people's photos. Are not my "friendly" messages (which they ignored) and my eBay report serve enough warning to them?...that they MUST remove all photos they stole from other people! And that they should NEVER use other people's images and claim as their own! I can't believe that they have to wait for the other original owners to take action, before removing all the rest of stolen images.

Anyways, all is good now! Our photos were completely removed. I hope all the remaining images left there are their own property.

Thanks so much to those who contacted the other owners.

**If you wish to purchase faux cupcakes, please purchase directly from the original sellers/makers. There are a lot of faux cupcake sellers/makers you can find on Etsy. Please purchase from us there.

I Got My First DD!

I've only been a member on deviantArt for only a month, and this one (photo above) got me my first Daily Deviation!

At first I thought it was just a glitched on the deviantArt's system after seeing messages by the thousands! And then I read messages giving me kudos on my DD!

Heck, I didn't even know what a DD (or Daily Deviation) is! LOL! :p

According to deviantArt, The Daily Deviation is a daily feature chosen from the galleries on deviantART.

A small assortment of submissions are chosen each day by a select group of staff/volunteer members who wish to showcase an image which they found impressive or otherwise interesting enough to deserve being brought to the attention of the community-at-large.

The staff/volunteer members responsible for selecting submissions for the daily feature often are open to suggestions and individual community members may direct their attention by noting the appropriate gallery moderator or staff member with a direct link to the deviation which you are suggesting and a brief description about why you think the work in question should be featured.

So I guess, those faux cupcakes of mine were interesting enough to be featured on Daily Deviation. Hehe!

So there, my first DD! Yay, me! :)

And since I got a DD last April 23, my DD is included in this month's feature news article Artisan Crafts DDs for April 2009. Yay, me again! Hehe! :)

Super thanks to oliverat for her suggestion!

And super thanks also to Kitten-of-Woe for DD feature!

A Poor Man's Makeshift Studio

Yes, I am poor. I don't have a fancy studio which I still dream of having one someday. I only own a lousy, obsolete model, point and shoot digital camera. I do own a manual Nikon camera which I still love...but in this day and age, we need to work fast. And digital is the answer! ...plus it'll save us more money since there is no need to buy film and have it processed. I wanted to buy a new Nikon digital camera, and I am drooling over D90. But school will open again in a few months and I have to pay for my son's tuition fee. (I'm not just poor, but also a single mom trying to make ends meet! :p)

So here is my setup:

- colored vellum sheet to use as a background
- desk lamp
- white tissue (japanese) paper to diffuse the light from the desk lamp
- styrofoam board to bounce some light
- sturdy table
- a wall (...ehehe) to stick the vellum onto
- scotch tape (...ehehe) to stick the vellum on the wall
- metal ruler to use as a weight on the vellum, because it keeps on curling! LOL!
- and a digital camera :)

...I'm pretty amazed with the ouput! It's not that bad at all! =D (click on the images to enlarge!)

Freshly Faked!

Here's a peek at my freshly faked cupcakes. These are just pics of my new faux cupcake bases, no frostings and decorations yet.

They look more realistic now, and comes in three flavors...errr...colors! LOL!

Butter, Red Velvet, and Dark Chocolate.

My New Faux Cupcakes, Coming Soon on my Etsy shop!

Coming Soon!

I'm pretty happy with my faux cupcakes. I guess I can say that I'm 99% satisfied with the way they look....but there's still this 1% to fill. So, I made some changes!

I change the way I make my fake cupcake bases. A lot more work, but they are now more realistic...and yummier!

I also experimented in using other different materials to embellish my faux cupcakes.

There's also a change in my packaging!

I'll be posting them on my Etsy shop really soon! ...so watch out!!!

P.S. ...yeah, that's a new faux cupcake I made on the photo above.

Faux Cupcake Tutorials

Ok, I've been getting a lot of emails about my faux cupcakes...like how do I make them. I've been always asked what is my secret recipe....and the secret recipe to my secret recipe is... a secret recipe! LOL!

Actually, it's no secret at all. My recipe is just "almost" the same as with the other faux cupcake makers out there (refer to the link list below). Although, I figured out mine by myself because during the time I fell in love with this craft, tutorials about making them were scarce. I guess we just vary with our process in making them, and how we wanted the output to be.

I like to work in "stages" and I don't try to finish a faux cupcake in a day. I spent a lot of time making just the base of the cupcake. And it can take me two days or so just making the base...I make sure that they're completely dried. My "process" kind of evolve during this whole time until it got this tedious! I always get ideas in my head and I always try them out. Although I'm trying to come up with a simpler method with the same output...because I get tired too sometimes, and I sleep with a wrist splint! hehe!

Anyways, here are somes links of tutorials I found online that uses "almost" the same materials as I use. Try the tutorials in these links and just add a little of your own creativity! :)

1. this is the first one that I tried - http://gardengoose.blogspot.com/2008/03/how-to-make-faux-cupcakes.html

2. Here's another great idea to on faking cupcakes:
http://lisatutmanoglesby.typepad.com/my_weblog/2008/08/almost-good-enough-to-eat.html

3. I've been searching for the simplest (and quick) method that is closest to mine and these are what I found so far ...it's from Crafty Avenue and another one from Zizooyou:

http://www.craftyavenue.com/school/articles/entry/9/94/

http://zizooyou.blogspot.com/2008/09/more-faux-cupcakes-tutorial.html

ENJOY!

(image: custom made faux cupcakes for Marie Christine Estepa of France)

Back with a New Logo and a Clearance SALE!

Look up at my header, I got a new logo! Well, I lost my old files so I need to make a new one! :p But I'm quite happy with this one. I made it in just a couple of hours, because I need to get some stickers and tags done by my printer. And I got them already and they look fabulous! :)




And yes, I'm back from my hibernation and my Etsy Shop is now OPEN once more. Actually I wasn't on vacation. I was working (...really hard) during this whole time. I did a freelance gig for this local TV Network Company (I'm a VFX/Compositor artist by profession), and it rerquired my full concentration, time, and effort! :p I worked for 12 hours a day (or more), no day-off's, and always on call...which left me no time for crafting. But now, that my contract has ended, which means no job for me in the next couple of months, it's crafting fiesta for me!

I need some space for new stuff, so I'm having a Clearance Sale! Please visit my Etsy Shop!

Bobby and Mildred's Wedding

Last Dec. 5, 2008 my cousin Bobby got married to his fiancée Mildred. The wedding was held at the historic place of Intramuros in Manila.

I was asked to create the wedding souvenirs for their sponsors. It was a bit of a rush work (I was asked a few days before the wedding!) ....but I had fun making them as always! :)

I wanted to list my faux cupcakes...and I couldn't load Etsy!!! Arrrrgggg!!!!!

I've already finished taking pictures of my handcrafted faux cupcakes. I'm ready to list them on Etsy. Etsy is a great site for people who wants to sell their craft products. However, for some unknown reasons, I suddenly couldn't load Etsy.com both in Firefox and Explorer. I thought that it could be a firewall thing, and that it's blocking Etsy. But even though I turned off my firewall I still can't seem to load that web site. I searched the internet for what could possibly be the culprit. I found out that there are people who are experiencing the same problem...and not just on Etsy, but also on some other secure sites. Some says it might be viruses like Malware that's preventing me to open the site. I did ran a scan to check my computer for viruses and potential attacks, and it's clean. So to be sure, I even reformatted my computer! But the problem persists. Some says it has to do with random DNS ....which I have no idea about!!! For three days I longed to see Etsy. And it's killing me. I ended up listing my products on other sites like DaWanda and SilkFair (which is not a bad idea!....and DaWanda is a great site for crafters, too!).

And now is my day 4 without Etsy, and no reply from my ISP!

Last night, out of my frustration, I went out to surf the net in a cafe! So there, I get to list my stuff on Etsy. Yeeeey!!!!

I just hope my ISP would call me anytime soon and help me fix the problem. :p

My Faux Cupcake Story

These past months, I've gone gaga over cupcakes. I've spent countless of hours surfing the net for recipes and tricks on baking that perfect cup. I've cried over my over baked cupcakes, and over my frostings that have gone bad. It's been quite a while since I started my quest on making my perfect cupcakes. And now, my cupcakes, though not perfect (yet), are "o.k."...and my son loves it. But due to the non-stop increasing prices of almost everything...including gas (and LPG which I use on my oven)... I have taken my cupcake baking addiction to a halt.

^One of the first batches of cupcakes that I have made.

I've since then diverted my attention to faux cupcakes instead, after stumbling upon few websites which create such fake treats. They looked so yummy for something that you cannot ever eat... and such an eye candy, too! And since I'm a crafty person myself, I wanted to get my hands busy creating some of those fakies. I think it's a great project idea to make and give out as gifts to family and friends. And as a single mom trying to make ends meet, I thought I could sell these (...if I even succeeded in making one), and create extra income. But how do you make one?

I have searched all over the internet for instructions and tips. I only found a few suggestions like to use "this" and "that" materials. What the heck? I might as well give it a try! So, I rushed to and rummaged my dad's garage for some left-over materials that I could use. I was really excited to create my first faux cupcake. Alas, I ended up with a very heavy, uninviting, sad looking cupcake. It's so heavy that I don't think it would be a great idea to even sell it. And darn, the fake frosting ran down like a mud slide after piping and cracked after drying.

I still have it, my first awful faux cupcake. I poked it with pens while still drying (...out of sheer frustration!) Now, it's sitting on my desk, posing as a pen holder.... an ugly one, that is! Yeah, I know, it's not just a fake cupcake...it's also a fake pen holder! LOL!




After my first attempt on making a faux cupcake, I still tried... and tried... and tried!. But to no avail, I still ended with same sad looking cup. I never thought that it would be this hard to create one that looks like the real thing. I couldn't sleep for weeks, trying to figure out how to do this. And the hardware store has been my favorite hangout after work. I would stand in the aisles and stare at different products. Would this one work? Or maybe that one? After trying out a handful of different products and materials, I have finally came up with my own formula (... and it's still a secret! Sorry!) My first faux cupcakes with this formula is way, way, way much better looking than my sad cupcake pen holder. And it's a lot lighter, too! Each faux cupcake is approximately 43 grams to 45 grams, while my sad looking faux cupcake weighs 135 grams (or even more!). And yes, they now look yummy! ...and no longer are they pen holders, they're now photo holders! Haha!


I have kept on polishing and perfecting my faux cupcake formula. I want my faux cupcakes to look as real as possible. I don't want my fake frosting to look dry, like those cake displays on cheap bakeries. I'm still experimenting on different materials. But for now, I'm very happy with my secret formula and I really enjoyed creating these fake sweet treats. I have already created different designs (or flavors...uh...whatever you call it!) of faux cupcakes. I remembered back in college, I have a package design class ....and I enjoyed creating the mockup or fake foods more than the packaging design itself!

Maybe for now, I'll be selling faux cupcakes on a "made-to-order" basis only. I'll take more pictures of the rest of my faux cupcakes and post it here next time.

But if you are interested in my faux treats, please email me at creativeabubot@gmail.com.

And for my next assignment... create a listing on ETSY ... and also, pimp my sad cupcake pen holder! :)