Shorewood bakery owner Kimberly Adams is a household name in the cake decorating business. She'll soon be back on TV to show off her talents.

The next two months are going to be exciting ones for famous cake artist and Shorewood bakery owner Kimberly Adams — and not just because of the holidays.

Thursday is Signature Sweets Day, according to a 2016 proclamation from former Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett honoring her Oakland Avenue bakery. And in December, Adams will be making two TV appearances.

An episode of Adams on "You Bet Your Life with Jay Leno" will be airing Dec. 5 and an episode of her competing on "The Big Bake," a Food Network Canada holiday baking competition series, will be airing on Dec. 12.

Adams is a veteran on the screen. She's previously competed on the Food Network seven times and Food Network Canada once; was a judge on "Buddy vs. Duff," a competition series between "Cake Boss" Buddy Valastro and pastry chef and former "Ace of Cakes" star Duff Goldman; and was also featured on "Sister Circle" and a Steve Harvey show.

Kimberly Adams has competed on 'The Big Bake' before

This was Adams' second appearance on "The Big Bake." In 2019, she competed on an episode called "Some-bunny Wants Cake."

This year, Adams and her "cake friends" Hemu Basu and Joel Gonzalez III joined forces to compete against two other teams on an episode themed "Naughty or Nice."

In March, Adams traveled to Toronto for the show. The teams got one day to prep, which could include forming a plan, sketching out designs, making sure they had what they needed and more. The next day was filming.

"We had to depict whether our character — whatever it was — was going to be naughty or if that character was going to be nice," Adams said. "Of course, we chose naughty."

The team, lead by Basu, created a 4-foot tall cake, Adams said. She couldn't reveal many more details than that — but you can tune into the Food Network on Dec. 12 to see what Adams and her teammates created and how they did.

Adams made her Food Network debut in 2010. One of her coworkers at AT&T, where she was a technical specialist, entered her in the "Hometown Showdown" cake-decorating contest in New York without telling her. She ended up winning.

Since then, Adams has competed on "Cupcake Wars," "Sugar Dome," "Macy's Thanksgiving Cake Spectacular," "Holiday Wars" and "Halloween Wars" twice.

"I've done it so much now, it's not so much as for me competition anymore," Adams said. "It's just something fun to do."

How she ended up doing trivia with Jay Leno this year

At the beginning of the year, Adams' friend sent her a casting notice for "You Bet Your Life with Jay Leno," a comedy game show on Fox.

Adams filled out an application to be on the show, then had a Skype interview with a producer.

"They ask you these questions about your life to try to see what your character is like and if you can carry on banter," Adams said. "Because you know Jay Leno, he's hilarious. So, he's going to ask you some questions and you're going to be caught off guard."

She was cast on the show, and her episode was filmed at a Los Angeles studio over the summer.

Leno brings out two contestants — who are meeting for the first time — and gets to know them and what they do.

"He's so down to earth and awesome," Adams said. "He's so cool. He was really nice."

Leno asks the two teammates trivia questions worth money. With each question, the team advances to a higher amount. At the end, contestants get to choose to walk away with what they've earned or attempt to double it by answering one last question, risking it all.

"This show was very fun," Adams said. "It was just answering questions. It was a complete 360 from what I typically do when I'm on a show."

To see how Adams and her teammate did, tune into Fox on Dec. 5.

For updates on the shows' air times, check Signature Sweets' Facebook or Instagram pages.

Signature Sweets Day plans festivities for Thursday

To celebrate Signature Sweets Day, the bakery will be giving away free cupcakes (while supplies last) on Thursday, Adams said. Attendees can choose between chocolate, vanilla and strawberry.

The bakery, 3801 N. Oakland Ave., will have turtle brownies, caramel cake, a variety of cupcakes, caramel apples and cheesecakes available for purchase.

Patrons who make a purchase Thursday will be given a raffle ticket for a chance to win a prize. There will be six prizes total: Three triple-layer holiday cakes for Thanksgiving and three birthday cakes (Two two-tiered ones and a 3-D one).

The winners' names will be pulled at the end of the day and will be announced at the bakery and on Signature Sweets' social media channels.

Signature Sweets' hours are noon to 6 p.m. Thursday and Friday, and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday.

Kimberly Adams follows her dreams and launches her cake business

Instead of playing outside, Adams spent her childhood in the kitchen, baking with her mom.

Adams — who graduated from Greendale High School and studied business management at Upper Iowa University — continued baking into adulthood and made cakes for family and friends.

In 2008, she made a cake for a coworker — a 3-D "gag" cake of a toilet. People were so impressed with the design, she said in a previous interview, that they started asking her to make cakes for them.

"It kind of just snowballed into an entire business," Adams said.

For years, Adams made cakes on the side while working full time at AT&T.

In 2013, she opened a Wauwatosa cake shop with a friend. Adams only planned on working there part time so that she could keep her day job.

But when the bakery began taking up too much time, they decided to close, Adams said, and she planned to revisit the idea at another point.

In 2016, Hall was featured on a Steve Harvey show about "people who work a full-time job, but their passion is something different," she said.

Adams was urged to pursue her baking dreams, got mentoring help from Lorraine Pascal, a judge on the Food Network's "Holiday Baking Champion," and "Real Housewives of New York" star Bethany Frankel, along with a $10,000 check from RetailMeNot.com.

In 2017, Adams started doing cakes full time. In December 2020, she opened her own bakery in the former home of Miss Cupcake Boutique Bakery.

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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Signature Sweets' Kimberly Adams to be on The Big Bake, Jay Leno show