Many steps to the final project!

Sometimes I get a cake idea and think "Gosh - that will be so simple to do!" Then I start the process and realize, "Gosh - this takes many, many steps to complete!" Case in point was the office monthly birthday cake for January. My thought process was - January, winter theme, penguins and igloos! Very cute, right?

I started the process by making the penguins. Since I was attempting my very first fondant figures, I knew I needed to get going on them so they would have time to dry. The first guy turned out to look like a "sumo penguin" - cute, but just a little super sized!(That's him on the far left!) He also lookes like he is wearing some kind of hood, but he was a good starting point for making the other two.

Next step was making the trees - I used sugar cones and layered royal icing over the top of them to shape them like evergreens. My first problem was my royal icing blended together, forming a solid sheet of green. NOT the effect I was looking for! I adjusted that by making lines of icing with a space in between - after that dried, I went up a row and did the same thing between the existing lines. Probably an easier way to do this, but it ended up working for me! The worst part really was the drying time. Overall it probably took me about 5 hours to finish all three trees!


I had made the igloo a week before, crumb coated it and had it waiting in the wings for final assembly. I rolled out the white fondant and then used a garland measurer (it was flexible to go around the curves) to press the "ice blocks" into the fondant. Once the sheet cake was frosted, I positioned the igloo on the cake. I decided it would be cute to make it look like a stash of snowballs was ringing the igloo.

The office loved the cake - I'm so lucky they support my efforts each month! The final product?





Now to start working on the February cake idea......

Getting better

All that practice is starting to pay off! This last week kept me busy baking and decorating my grandmother's 91st birthday cake. My grandmother has commissioned me to make her 100th birthday cake - I love that she is looking so far ahead! I decided that she didn't need to wait that long though for me to decorate a cake for her. Since I was going to see her this past weekend, I figured I would surprise her with a birthday cake (her actual birthday being Wednesday). Overall, I am pleased with her cake. The fondant was nice and smooth and looked very pretty. The flower turned out well - however I do wish the gold luster dust edging had been a little more visible. After seeing the finished project, I would have added some kind of curly type things around the flowers - kind of like gold sparkly curls.

I compare this cake with another fondant birthday cake I did last year - I can see where I have improved! It is important for me to look back and see where I was and how far I have gotten. Otherwise, I have a tendency to get discouraged when something doesn't turn out the way I have envisioned it.

The best part though - my grandmother liked the cake so much that she saved it to serve (and show off) at the birthday party her widow's group is holding for her later this week.

Fondant or Buttercream...

...that is the question! I've always loved the look of fondant cakes - they look so pretty and you can do so much more with them. That being said - I have to say that I really want to get to the point with my buttercream smoothness that you can't tell if it's buttercream or fondant!

Whenever I start to decorate a cake, for my workplace or hubbies, I have to ask myself am I doing fondant or buttercream? Both have their challenges. Buttercream, for me anyway, can be a pain the neck because I never can seem to get the edges of a cake covered. I've been told not to worry about it too much since it will be covered by a border. It's frustrating because I have seen numbers of "how to" videos that show a buttercream cake (sans borders) that do not have this issue. I switched to an icing tip, which helped a lot. I think I wasn't getting enough icing to cover the cake - my layer was more like a second crumb coat.

Fondant's challenges can be numerous as well! I've had issues, with this cake in particular, with not enough fondant to cover the cake, pleating and tearing. I had to take off the fondant and redo it four times before I was able to achieve the perfect look I wanted.

Practice.... I'm starting to hate that word.... and patience is what I need. It will get better and it will be awesome.

Why is that dog wearing a wig?

.... Is what my husband said looking at my practice cake. The good news is - at least he recognized that it was a dog. The bad news - I really am not a free hand cake decorator! The writing turned out ok, for a first attempt. I think I will be investing in a set of alphabet presses though - from everything I have heard it makes the writing much, much simpler to do. The practice cake, although admittedly not one of my best, did make a favorable impression at the physical therapist's office. Ironically - everyone on staff recognized the dog as being Rufus, the office mascot, and didn't think the ears was a wig! LOL

Things to work on: The bottom edges of the cake. Still work on the writing and figure out a way to keep the cake from cracking in the fold. (You can't see it as it is under the ribbon bookmark!)

Favorable points on this cake: my buttercream was nice and smooth. The borders went on easily and looked good. The page edger process is pretty easy to manage.

Overall - I think this cake is ok. Not one of the worst, not one of the best. The practicing must continue!

Practice makes perfect!

My youngest is being confirmed in May of this year. His confirmation class is the largest the church has had, with 13 kids being confirmed. As a caker, I look for opportunities to expand my caking experiences and stretch my boundaries! With this thought in mind, I volunteered to make the cake for the confirmation reception. I have in mind to make a 1/2 sheet cake that will have a chalice, loaf of bread and wheat stalks made of gumpaste. Included in this masterpiece I am planning on an open book (Bible) with each of the kids' names written on the pages. Sounds very grand and large! The large part I can handle, its the writing part I'm worried about! So - practice I think! Yeah, I can do that. So now everyone I know will be getting a book cake of some sort so I can practice my writing.

This week the lucky cake winner is my physical therapy group. I'm discovering, however, that its not just the writing I will need to practice. The open book pan has some very odd angles to it and I had a difficult time getting the icing to cover the cake and then smoothing the icing. Today, the cake is a plain white surface, smooth, but not quite enough icing. I'm hoping the decorating part of this will cover all that up and it will turn out, if not a work of art, at least a good practice!

How hard could it be....

to bake and decorate cakes! After all - Duff (on Ace of Cakes) makes it look so easy! Boy, was I in for a big wake up call after I finally signed up for my first cake decorating class. I had decorated cakes before, mainly for my boys, copying designs I found on the internet to match the birthday boy's theme of the year. Most of them even turned out pretty good! Nothing says cake like a ton of sprinkles and frosting. So, now, after a few months of classes I am prepared to eat cake...and admit that it is not as easy as I thought it would be. On the other hand, it is also much more addicting and satisfying than I had ever anticipated. I am learning the trials and tribulations of smooth icing, working with fondant and stacking cakes. I look at some of my earlier cakes, ones that I thought were so wonderful, and compare them to my cakes today and realize what a long way I have come. I look at the cakes I am making now and look forward to a long and exciting journey to creating my "Ace of Cakes".