Thursday, October 28, 2010

Cue Graduation Theme...

I can't even think of what the graduation theme is. Whenever I try to think of it, I'm pretty sure it's Dark Vader's theme from Star Wars. I know, I'm weird.

Well, last night was our graduation from our cake decorating class. It has been fun and informative, but A LOT of work. I do NOT want to make another batch of icing to save my life.

So, for our last class, we learned how to write on cakes and make ribbon flowers. Both of which will require A LOT more practice than we got last night. The rest of the night was spent on decorating a cake.

We were told that we could decorate our cake however we wanted to, we just needed to bring whatever we needed. This is how I went about preparing for my cake.

1) I thought about it. What did I want the theme to be? They had a bunch of cakes you could do in the book, but I didn't like any of those so I decided to venture out on my own. Eureka! It's almost Halloween, I'll do a Halloween themed cake.

2) I thought of a cute way to make pumpkins be the border of the cake.

3) Since the dimensional piping was my favorite thing to learn, I decided to use that on the cake. So, I took out my trusty PrintShop program and found some great Halloween-y things that I wanted to put on the cake.

4) Then Brent helped me with this spooky tree I wanted to put on the cake. (It was a lot of work and he was so patient...he's great!)

5) I made my icing to exact specifications. (The gray of the cake did not turn out exactly how I wanted it to, but it was my first time using the black coloring. It's a pain. There's a stain on my rug to prove it.)

6) I decorated my cake. Drum roll please....

And the pumpkin border...
I have to say, I love the pumpkin border. It came out exactly how it was suppose to!

(Again, these were taken with my cell phone camera, which doesn't love to do close ups, but I was afraid it would get damaged on the way home.)

I'm reasonably happy with how it turned out. It's not exactly how I planned. And there are a few things that bug me when I look at it - why do all the pumpkins tilt the same way - but for my first try at designing and decorating my own cake, I think I did well.

To contrast my obsessive compulsive, control freak way of designing cakes, this is how Marcela designed her cake.

1) She knew she wanted to put flowers on it.

2) She made some icing.

3) She decorated her cake.

And here it is....

Another fine example of a beautiful cake.

I just chuckled at the differences in our personalities.

Our teacher was trying really hard to get us to take the next class in the group. It's mostly royal icing flowers, which I'm pretty sure is my mom's favorite thing in the world. There's no way I can take it until the new year, so we'll see.

7 comments:

Mom said...

Beautiful Cake....you did a fantastic job and it showed that you put a lot of thought into it. You aren't going to want anyone to cut it up!!! You've learned some neat things and made some great cakes/cupcakes! I am sure you can do a lot of fancy decorating now. Great Job...and maybe next year you will be ready for the second part of the class...I don't think royal icing is my favorite thing in the whole world...I think it is Mrs. Backers Buttercream flowers!!! YUM!!! So good - but some of the flowers you did on your cupcakes looked like theirs!!! Now you have me hungry for cake...Ash...you are amazing!

Courtney said...

Very fun! I like your Halloween theme! Is the frosting tasty? That's always my concern with cute cakes - the the frosting looks good but won't taste good. Good job!!

Jess said...

OH MY HECK.. I love your cake. So creative and aborable!

I am very impressed with all that you learned. I can't wait to take the class sometime here. Nice work Ash!

Chelsea said...

I love your cake! I'm sure it tastes delicious as well. Or maybe you won't eat your work of art...huh?

Jenny Moore said...

I love Dark Vader!!!
Congrats on your cake decorating graduation!!! You passed with flying colors...we'll expect something impressive at Thanksgiving!!!

Kathy said...

What a great job you did! Not only decorating a cake but designing it too. You are very creative. Congrats on a great cake.

Julie said...

Those are both awesome! You and Marcela are very talented. Congrats on a successful class!