Cake= a great gift for Mom!

As promised, I am excited to share the cake I made/decorated yesterday! The other day My roommate Leif and I were watching TV and out of the blue he said, "So what's the going rate for a mom's day cake?" I got the biggest smile on my face and just said, "REALLY?!?!" I was so ecstatic that he asked me to make a cake for his mom. I am at the point where I feel weird/bad charging people (since I am still learning and practicing) so I just asked him to replace the materials that I used. I was excited all week to make the cake and yesterday it was finally time. I know I have not updated on my 2nd level of class yet, but it is all about flower and cake design using fondant, gum paste and royal icing. That being said, I really wanted to do some fondant work with this cake. For the class I bought Wilton fondant that was already made and colored (definitely does not taste as good as making your own fondant) so practicing some flowers was pretty easy.
Leif didn't have any specific ideas for the cake, just that he wanted it to say something regarding mothers day, so I had a lot of creative freedom with it.



I started off making my flowers (pansy's)

Rolled out purple fondant (mixed with some gum paste so they would harden) but out with a cookie cutter

I went around the edges with a balling tool to give it the shape (this is the hardest part for me!)

Doing the individual petals. The sponge helps prevent tearing and is easier to form them on.

Assembled and ready to dry in the flower former to help it keep its "flower" shape.

On goes the little middle thinger...no idea what that is called :) Gum paste adhesive was used to help all of the elements stick on.

Just a different type of former I decided to use.

For the cake I still went with my trusty yellow box mix. That cake release I showed in this earlier entry has seriously been my saving grace when it comes to getting my cakes out of the pan without trouble! With that being said, I did mess up some when flipping out this cake. I did it to slow and there for it had a big crack down the middle. Luckily this was an easy fix. I simply just cut the cake in half and stacked them on top of each other!

 

Leif's only request was to have it filled with strawberries.

the butter cream frosting getting all mixed up! For class use, we only used crisco instead up crisco and butter, this time I added the butter and what a difference! I may have dipped my finger in the frosting a few times... :)

Mixing in a teeny bit of yellow gel. I wanted the cake to have a very pale yellow base.

The leftovers that I would use to pipe the border and do the writing. This would eventually be colored pink.

After I filled it and assembled it, I put in in the freezer for about 20 minutes to firm up the cake so it would be easier to frost.

Remember, always start with a big pile of frosting so you don't pull crumbs off of the cake.

All frosted, now I needed to smooth it out.

 

Going over the frosting with a hot metal spatula will help give it that smooth look.

Now I just needed to decorate it. I will admit, I had been doing a bit of drinking while decorating. This may become obvious in some of the pictures!

Doing the 'dot' border.

I got ambitious and added a quote around the cake. It says," A mother is a person who seeing there are only four pieces of cake for five people, promptly announces she never did care for cake".  ~Tenneva Jordan. I had seen this one one of the other blogs I follow and loved the quote!

I added the fondant flowers the the edge of the cake and had them going over the edge a bit.

I think the writing was the real victim of the alcohol :)

I loved the flowers!

I was, overall, really happy with how the cake turned out. Practicing with the fondant flowers was really fun and a lot easier to work with then I thought it would be. My 3rd cake and I feel like (hopefully) I am improving with each one. I really hope to make another one soon...anyone need a cake?? ;)
I hope his mom enjoys the cake as much as I enjoyed making it.
Happy Mother's day!