GASP! What happened to May?!

Just noticed that I completely MISSED posting the photos of the biggest one's birthday cake!!  This year's theme was FROZEN, of course, which was FUN to do and fun to make!  We started out her 5th birthday celebration this year with a friend party at a gymnastic place, with cupcakes:

These guys were fun and easy to make!  I found the eyeball candies in the cake section at Safeway, mixed up some black frosting and went to town.  The blue around their bodies are supposed to be reminiscent of the little blue pants that they wear.

For her actual birthday, she let me do a "Frozen" cake, which took some convincing, because not a week before that she wanted me to make her a Hercules cake! After searching high and low for some sort of Elsa cake topper/toy, and having no luck, I tried my hand at sculpting, with also no luck.  Last ditch effort, was to find a graphic online, print it out, stick it to a stick.  Miss 5 year old was thrilled.

I was also pretty happy with the looks of this cake - I'm still working on find the perfect recipe for the INSIDE of the cake, along with a yummy delicious filling.  The snowflake cutters were the funnest in this cake - they were so cute, and fun to stamp out little fondant snowflakes.  The "ice" was a little tricky, as it was a hair humid at my house that week, so when I made the glass a couple of nights before, some pieces were crystallizing by her birthday.  None the less, it was a fun cake to make. 

Minnie Mouse.

Minnie Mouse is a favorite of my baby girl.  Every day she asks to watch "Mouse" on TV, carries around a Minnie Mouse stuffy, and often comes and shows it to us.  She even has a little Minnie Mouse dress up doll thing that she loves.  So, for her birthday this year we decided it was appropriate that she have a Minnie Mouse theme!  We didn't go crazy this year, but did manage to get my folks to come to her birthday party!  I decided to make a Minnie Mouse cake as well, although was intimidated by lots of the cakes that I was seeing online.  I ended up finding one that I thought I could pull off. 

For the cake, I decided to do a bottom up cake using this recipe, which I ended up tripling to get enough for two 8" square pans and a small 1/2 circle cake.  I also used Sweetapolita's whipped vanilla buttercream frosting recipe.  It is delicious!  The end result - (I had baby girl's name on it, but blurred it out):

 

I have to admit, I wasn't that excited about the buttercream bottom when I was trying to get it smooth, but once I started putting stuff on it, I started to mind less.  I was reminded why I am drawn to fondant, it's ultra smooth texture is so nice and clean.  I've struggled in the past covering cakes with just fondant, and didn't want to go that route again, so opted for the buttercream and struggled there too!  In the end, i thought the face ended up adorable, and I love the polka dots and decorations on the side of the cake.  

Another issue I ran into.  Beings that I work at my job during the day, I was working on this cake in stages.  I baked it Monday, and decided to save myself some time Tuesday night and buttercream it - which in total with baking probably took me 3-4 hours.  On Tuesday, I did all the decorating with the fondant, which ended up taking me another 2-3 hours.  But then it sat another day until we had the party Wednesday night.  I wasn't sure what to do - I didn't really want to put it in the fridge in fear that the fridge would completely dry it out, but it ended up being a little dry from sitting on the counter for 2.5 days.  Ideally, I suppose, "real" bakeries bake one day and decorate the next?  I'm curious what everyone else does!

Wilton Fondant and Gum Paste Class 3 & 4

I have officially completed the Wilton Fondant and Gumpaste course.  I didn't take any pictures at the 3rd Fondant and Gum Paste class, but it was a very fun class.  We learned how to make Carnations and Fantasy flowers...and I believe something else, but I don't remember what.

Last night was the last class of the course.  We were going to make our grand finally cake - and I chose a Fantasy flower cake.  We also learned how to make a fondant box, which was cute, some borders, and learned to do inlays...all very cute and fun.  

Along with this class I decided to make my own fondant - a marshmallow fondant, which in the end was fine, but it was MISERABLE to make...it kept tearing and was super hard to work...my hands were very tired.  I used it to cover my cake this week:

So obviously it isn't perfect.  The problem with the marshmallow fondant is that it stretched a LOT when i went to cover the cake...so got VERY thin.  When we went to cut into it last night it was so thin that it was hard to separate the fondant from the buttercream.  

Anyways, here's my cake decorated:

I LOVE the pearl border and I love how the scarf looks...I think it turned out really well.  And by the time I was ready to decorate at the class, it took me about 20 minutes to finish up.  Granted, I had already rolled all of my pearls for the border, built my flowers...all I really had to do was the scarf, which took me a couple of tries, but I was patting myself on the back...I thought it turned out great.

HOWEVER Lindsay, the teacher, showed us some of her cakes and let me tell you, hers were AMAZING.  SOOOO cute.  She made herself an Elephant cake for her own birthday, which was ADORABLE.  I just wish I could post her pictures on here!

I've decided to take a break, and not take Course 2 - it's buttercream flowers, of which I think I can figure out by myself.  Although I am considering taking the next fondant course in May!

Wilton Fondant and Gum Paste Class 1 & 2

I enrolled in the next cake decorating course, and went to the 1st class last Wednesday.  It was very fun, we covered a cake board (which I think is a silly practice, but whatev), and made a few daisies and leaves.  They were just for practice, and I had forgotten all of my food coloring so I ended up with white and blue leaves and flowers.

The next class was more of the same, we were supposed to make leaves and flowers at home along with a cake to decorate.  During the class we also learned how to make a carnation base, a drape, and a little handkerchief for decorating...all very cute and very fun.  Check out my semi-finished cake below...I didn't have time to finish the bottom ribbon border, and Matt was ready to eat it by the time I got home...so I didn't finish it at home either! 

Wilton Course 1 Class 4

Damn roses.

I didn't get a picture of my cake this week, but I can say that it was nothing special to look at.  AT ALL.  Our task this week was to build roses and put them on your cake.  We also learned how to make a sweet pea, and some leaves.

Well my roses STUNK.  It was so weird.  The book says 'use stiff icing for roses', but those of us who had stiff icing were having the WORST time making roses that looked pretty.  Only the 7th grader who had soupy icing had beautiful roses - and the teacher admitted it!  She said she didn't understand what the problem was, that the consistency of our icing was correct, but our roses were NOT turning out pretty.  She also tried making roses with our icing and couldn't do it either.

Damn roses.

AND to top it off, I managed to make 4 roses that looked below average and sub par, but I put them on my cake anyways.  Then I put the tupperware thingy back on to go home and smooshed all my damn roses.

Next week, Wilton Fondant and Gum Paste Class 1.  Hopefully we won't have to make any roses.

Wilton Course 1 Lesson 3

I mentioned last week that course 3 would be figurines - specifically they were supposed to be clowns.  Well, I decided that I didn't want to fork out the money to buy the clown heads, cause I didn't see myself ever using them again.  So I intended on making headless clowns with my butter-cream frosting, but after I had one on my cake, I thought it looked creepy and dumb, so I scraped them off.

Anyhoo, in this weeks class we learned how to do the shell border, which does take some finesse, of which I don't have much of.  We also learned how to make hearts, and round balls, and some flowers.  Oh, and the clowns...which sucked.  We also worked more on the Rose, which is suprisingly hard.  And to add to the pressure, we have to make a cake next week that will contain 6-7 roses on top!!!!!!  EEK!!! I'm in trouble.  Hopefully someone will take pity on me and give me some of their beautiful roses.

Here is this weeks cake.  Like I said, I didn't like my clowns, so I decided to go with flowers and the shell border instead.

Before:

And After:

Wilton Course 1 Lesson 1

First of all, Happy Birthday Little Brother.  I can't believe you're 25.

The milestones of turning 25; lower car insurance!  Ha!  And you can get rental cars for a little cheaper.   Brother asked me if there was anything else to look forward to now (after 25), I thought about it...and nope, it's pretty much all downhill from there.  heh heh heh

Ok on to my real post.

I signed up for a Wilton cake decorating class at the local Michaels, and went to my 1st class on Wednesday night.  It was kind of a 'watch and learn' class, but suprisingly it went really fast - it's a 2 hour class.  I did learn how to roll a parchment piping container, and a few other tips and tricks that should be helpful in my cake decorating career.  Hehe.  What I think is awesome and amazing is that the teacher said that she took the clas 1.5 years ago, then took the rest of the courses, and now is selling cakes as a side business!  Awesome!  I'm looking forward to next week's class - we have to take a baked cake and decorate it.  I'll try to remember to post some pictures!

cupcake.

Ever since having the baby, I've watched a lot of Food Network.  Not a little now and then.  A lot.

And I've decided that I really enjoy baking.  Whether it be some poppyseed bread, banana bread, cupcakes, cookies, candy...  For Christmas I gave candy as gifts, although I'm not sure that people consider homemade candy a gift - but I consider it a delicacy.  

Anyways for Christmas I asked for cake decorating tips.  And not only did I get a wide variety of those, but I also got a fantastic book, colors, and all the stuff I'd need for piping little creations. (Thanks Mom!) 

My 1st attempt was on waxed paper, and was BOORRRINNG.  So Matt "suggested" that I make him some cupcakes (I'm on the diet, remember?), and decorate those.  So, I did.  I tried out some various patterns,  The white ones are the result of me getting tired, running out of colored icing and calling it a day.

OH, and on a side note,  Matt has given me a 'pass' for tonight, and I'm going to a cake decorating class at Michaels!!  I'm excited, although have some guilt about being gone from Miss Muffit and missing her bedtime.