And, one disaster. My poor brother. He graduated on Saturday and I was going to make him a cake. Well, I did make him a cake but it never got to the party. I made a Topsy turvy cake, and it was cursed from the beginning. The top tier was confetti cake with confetti icing, that's my brother's favorite flavor. So I started to carve and assemble the top tier when I realized that confetti cake is almost impossible to carve, so let's just say, that cake ended up awful so I baked him a new cake. After my cakes were crumb coated and ready for fondant, my fondant started acting up, so I decided, hey I'll just do a butter cream topsy turvy. So after I iced it and assembled it, it was perfect, absolutely perfect, I was so happy with my application of butter cream. So by this time, it was 2:30 am, because I do all of my cakes and cookies after I put my kiddos to bed. It's impossible to do it while they are awake, one it takes away from them, and two, I just can't stop and then start, I have to get in my groove of decorating. So I went to bed only to wake up the next morning to half of Sean's cake on the counter. That's right, it fell. What happened is the top tier had more cake then normal and I didn't even think that the base of that cake might not be supportive enough to hold it. I should have used a more sturdy support system, because my cake slid right off of it's base, I was so upset that I cried. I assembled the cake perfectly, exactly how it's supposed to be done, but didn't think of that dang base. Poor Sean didn't get his cake, and it was perfect. All I had left was to do the decorative part of the cake. If I didn't have two more orders for this weekend, I would have started over no problem, but I just didn't have enough hours in my days to complete it. I'm going to include the only picture I have of it before it fell. I took it from my phone so it's probably a little blurry. I thought I'd start my post with the disaster and end with the goodies. This cake at this point was iced in all butter cream, no fondant. See the tecate in the background? I could have used one on Friday morning after seeing my cake smashed on the counter. Oh well, we enjoyed eating my disaster. I'm grateful too that this was a great learning experience, now I'll never make the same mistake.
These next two cakes were my orders for this weekend. One on Saturday and one on Sunday, same sweetie. The first was for her daughter's birthday. After talking with her, we decided it would be great to do a purse cake. They had a party of 35-40 so I decided it would be good to do a purse cake on top of a hat box cake so that she didn't just have this huge purse cake. She wanted browns and burnt oranges for colors. I covered the purse in fondant, and the hat box lid is also fondant, the bottom cake is butter cream with butter cream accents. The flowers and beading on the purse are also done in butter cream. The lipstick and stuff on the purse are real, I'm one of those people that thinks a cake does not have to be ALL edible because then it starts to look a little junky. This cake got rave reviews, they thought it was from Tasteful Cakes and my business cards were all gone!! That's so exciting! When I delivered it, someone there said watch out Ace of Cakes, hahaha. That always makes me feel good!! Of course they don't know about my mishap that happened the day before!! This shows that there are good days, and sometimes, REALLY bad days!! I am in love with this cake and I know there are a lot of pictures but every angle was a good one, and that does not always happen.
This next cake was for my sweetie's dad. He is retired navy and that seems to be what defines him. When we were discussing cake ideas, that's what we ran with. My Mom came up with the idea of maybe getting a picture of him in his uniform as a young man and putting it on a cookie on the cake. After we went through some of her pictures, the two we went with were outstanding. He's not in his uniform but it's an old black and white. His wife, my sweetie's Mom, passed away a few years ago and I thought it would be really nice to put her on there as well. I decided to not do the cookies but to put them right on the cake. I love this cake. When my sweetie came to pick it up, she teared up and said that it was probably going to make her Dad cry as well. When I get a reaction like that from a cake, I'm so happy. I love to make my sweetie's cakes so personal, I think that's what it's all about!
Her Mom was so movie star gorgeous.
Her Mom was so movie star gorgeous.
