Farm Themed Birthday Cake

What a crazy weekend! Friday was my daughters 13th, we had family over, then she had a friend party Saturday, but before that we had the last T-ball game, and I had another cake. A friend of ours asked if I could do their little boys first birthday cake. I wanted to SO bad, I'd had the chance to do his brothers first birthday cake too. She had the cutest cake she wanted made. I spent the week prior baking a total of 8 cakes, -16 layers total between the 3 cakes I did this weekend.

This little haystack was for the birthday boy, it's just a 3 layer, 6" round cake, carved to look like  haystack.

 The barn on top gave me some trouble. It was a hot day and the fondant and icing knew it. The barn is fondant, the pig and cow are buttercream with fondant accents. 10", 8", and 6" round layers. I was SO nervous driving this to the party. I was by myself, and I could see that cake jiggle every time I hit a tiny bump. I should go into business, and  buy a car suitable for cake transportation and write off the vehicle :)

Sugar and spice

...and everything nice. A simple baby shower cake based off of the Carter baby shower theme.

I threw the shower for my friend, Serina. It a 3 layer, 10" round white cake with chocolate mousse in the middle. I got a lot of compliments on the flavor. I'd never actually used pudding in the middle. Not that I hadn't thought about it, but it just hadn't appealed to me. And unless I can ensure it will be chilled, it seems like it would be yucky. I'll have to try a new flavor next time. All the color is fondant, the white is buttercream. I've been having trouble with the buttercream tasting different, still good, but not as good. I'm still not sure what the problem was. Since then I bought more Crisco, and a new butter flavoring, and it seems to have helped. I know the taste of bad Crisco, so I'm thinking it was the butter flavor, does that stuff go bad?! Huh, might have to look into that.

Yo Gabba Gabba Birthday Cake

This was the largest cake I've made. We were trying to figure out how many hours it took me. With baking time of the SEVEN cakes, it was about 16 hours. Crazy huh!? It was fun to do once I had the cakes baked and the fondant/frosting thing figured out. I wanted to use buttercream for all the cakes, but the red frosting, although red, looked funny. It looked separated, like it might if the frosting got hot. So it went under the fondant. I don't like to cover cakes in fondant, I don't like to give someone a cake where they have to eat so much fondant. And I just don't like covering the cakes, I'd rather frost it. But, for the look I wanted, fondant was the best choice for this particular cake.

All the cakes together, at home. I couldn't assemble it until I got to the party.

A picture of the assembled cake at the party, with a cake topper

The three tiers are a 12", 10" and an 8" round cake, the bottom and middle were 2 layers, top was 4 layers. The individual cakes were for the birthday boy and girl. They are 2 layer 6" round cakes. I was able to use frosting for most of the little cakes(I love the little green monster).

Another Pink Skull Cake

Reese is Serina's niece, she's a sweet girl. We used to see her a lot when her and Teresa went to the same school. She saw the pink skull cake I made and wanted one for her 10th birthday. I was happy to do it. I'd never really duplicated a cake before, so this was kind of fun. For one, it was simple to do, since I'd done it before. And fun to try and make it a little unique for Reese. She wanted white cake with strawberry filling. I made a 3 layer 10" round cake (boy was it tall). Most of it was buttercream with black store bought icing. The skull on top was fondant.

First Birthday Cake

A friend asked if I could make a cake for her daughters first birthday. A girly first birthday cake, of course!

Seussical Cast Party Cake

The junior high just finished putting on Suessical the Musical Jr. They did such a fantastic job. Of course, I had to make them a cake, or two. The first one is the cat's hat, it's 5 layers of chocolate cake, red is fondant, white is buttercream. Sounds easy, it wasn't ;) The second cake is a 3 layer sheet cake(strawberry and vanilla) I thought it would be fun to put everyone's name on it(WHAT WAS I THINKIN?) It took me about an hour to get all the names on it. I think there were close to 70 names. They were fun to make, and the kids loved seeing their names.

 

I bought the Wilton premade frosting in a tube to get the red and black,
 it's the only way to go, especially since I can put the tips right on the tube.



This one is all frosting accept the red of the hat, that is fondant.
It took me a whole 1oz jar of food coloring to get all this red.



What's black and white and...a little red?

A bridal shower cake for one of the teachers at the school. Not my favorite, I didn't have a lot of time to do this one. I always make a chocolate cake for the school, you just can't go wrong. But this time I added a little raspberry filling in between the layers. I went with an 8" square pan, 3 layers. On top is an 8" round cut into a square. The roses are just rolled fondant and the black ribbon is fondant with a little lace top piped on.