Flowers

So, it should be no surprise to anyone that knows me, this next competition cake is going to be heavy on the flowers.  I LOVE gumpaste flowers, and feel that I am pretty good at them.  I recently took a class on dusting flowers, and was amazed at the difference using more than one or two shades of color on the same flower can make!!

These are the flowers from the class I took (and they ALL started out WHITE, except the leaf):

I have typed up a list of all the flowers (and colors of those flowers) that I am planning to make for my cake.  It is quite a daunting list!!!  There are almost a thousand individuals flowers that I'm going to be making - small flowers, regular flowers, buds, leaves, etc..  There are thirteen varieties of flowers, in a multitude of colors.  I have a feeling they are not all going to fit on the cake, in that case I'll have quite a few leftover competition-worthy flowers! 

I have decided, rather to write up a blog post for each day of working on the flowers, that I would write one up on each flower I am making.  There are other elements to the cake besides just the flowers, and there will be posts on each of those elements too!  The cake show is the end of April so, unfortunately, you'll have to wait until then to see them - but rest assured I am writing them as I work on the flowers!!

~Chelle

National Capital Area Cake Show

As you noticed, from one of my previous posts today, I went down to Virginia to another cake show.  This one was held in Annadale, VA at the Northern Virginia Community College.  It seemed to be a great venue, much better than the high school it was at last year.

I, of course, did not go all by myself.  My trusty sidekick, JEM, and I both went.  We planned to spend the day on Friday in DC, so we left home on Thursday morning.  We made excellent time (considering we went over the GWB, lol) and were in Virginia, in the hotel a mere 9 hrs later!!!  (Sure beats the 12hrs it took us last year!)  We, again, got some audio-books to listen to on the trip.  This time we got them from the library.  We rented a couple of books that we have already read, figuring if we zoned out, lost track, etc.... it wouldn't matter, lol.  We got Three to Get Deadly by Janet Evanovich and Four to Score, also by Janet Evanovich.  We didn't quite finishe the first on by the time we got to Virginia, but finished it before we headed home on Monday.  We didn't get to finished the second book on the way home, but have a month before it's due back at the library, so I'm sure we'll get to finish it by then, lol.   A word to the wise........these books are NOT appropriate for children!!!!!   I'm not going to elaborate...if you need to know why go ahead and read them, lol!

The cake show was Saturday and Sunday, with the awards ceremony on Sunday afternoon.  I entered one cake (as shown in a previous post), and JEM entered four cakes - one decorated (Beginner) and three tasting cakes.  I'm happy to say that I won a First Place ribbon for my cake, and JEM won a Second Place ribbon for her decorated cake and a Third Place ribbon for her pound cake.

Here is my decorated cake:

 

and here is JEM's!

There were many cool features on the cakes this year.  Here are some of the pictures I took, with my commentary on them :)

 Gorgeous flowers!!

These are all made from Chocolate Clay!

This bow looked REAL!  It's so clean!

Love the lace points!

Very nice veining on the rose petals!

LOVED how they made it look like the back of a dress!

Gorgeous color on these roses!

Love the look of rose petals 'floating' on the cake

The pic is a little distorted, but the brush embroidery is fabulous!

LOVE the tufting of the fondant!!

Like the hand painted grass on this cake

Exquisite extension work - what's not to love????  The piping is so fine too!

The colors on this cake are absolutely stunning!!  (Doesn't hurt that blue is my favorite color, lol)

Another cake that stole my heart - Mickey Mouse!!!!

This cake was painted in BUTTERCREAM!   I was amazed!!!

Oriental Stringwork is always amazing to look at!

The shades of color on these flowers make them look almost ethereal!

This cake was just sooooo cute!!!!

Princess Cake

I did a Princess themed birthday cake for another cousin's daughter around the beginning of March.  I had gone to the toy store and found some Princess tiara's, jewelry, etc... .that I thought was adorable.  I decided to make the cake in the shape of a pillow, and then sit the jewelry, etc... on top of it.

I first baked two 12" square cakes, then leveled, torted and filled them.  Then used a bread knife to shape the cake into something close to pillow shaped, lol.

The birthday girl loves bright pinks and purples and "girly colors."   So, I frosted the cake in hot pink buttercream.  Then decided to put some ruffles on it, like a pillow.  I also had purchased sparkly piping gel and used that to decorate the top as well.

Once I got to the party, I placed the Princess jewelry onto the cake, then put the candles in and lit the candles.  I thought that leaving the piping gel to dry overnight would dry it enough that it wouldn't stick to the plastic toys.  I was wrong!  It was a whole lot of fun cleaning the piping gel off of the jewelry and tiara, lol!

Tractor Trailer Tire

Around the beginning of February, I did a birthday cake for my cousin's son.  He wanted a John Deere Cake, and the idea I came up with was to do a huge tractor tire.  He loved the idea, so that's what I did.


I started out by baking two 14" cakes, since I wanted to make sure there was plenty of cake for the party. I leveled, torted, filled and stacked the cakes.  Then took a bread knife and started cutting away on the outside of the cake to make a tire shape.  I then attacked the center (with a smaller knife) to cut out the middle.

Then I frosted the cake with whipped buttercream, and rolled out black fondant to cover it with.  Covering a cake (with a hole in it!) with fondant is no easy feat.  I finished putting the fondant on and smoothing it, only to see it starting to rip in the center where the hole was.  So, I took an exacto knife and made slits in the fondant so it was lay flat along the inside of the tire.  I figured I'd find something to cover it with later.  I then took a dogbone gumpaste tool and made tire tread marks on the sides of the cake, as a tire has.  I looked at the pictures I had of John Deere tires, and they have a yellow center to them.  Perfect!!  I rolled out some yellow fondant, cut a circle put it on the inside, covering up my ripping black fondant.  I also piped a star edge around the yellow to neaten it up.

I had also purchased some John Deere hot wheels-type cars to put on the cake, since the birthday boy wanted a construction site.  He described the construction site as "having lots of dirt and rocks", so that's what he got!  The piles of dirt are mounds of frosting covered in home-made "dirt" (graham cracker, brown sugar, white sugar, pepper, nilla wafers and cocoa powder all ground up).  The rocks are chocolate rocks I bought somewhere (no idea where, lol).  I used piping gel to get the rocks to stay in the trucks, and frosting for the piles of dirt in the trucks.

Here's a close up of the trucks:

 

The birthday boy was extremely happy with his cake!

Nirvana

Hello faithful readers!   I apologize it's been a looooooooooong time since I posted anything new.  I have been busy getting my cake entry for National Capital Area Cake Show ready.  As I mentioned a while ago, I would not be posting entries specifically about the cake I was working on, lest judges be reading my blog.  However, I had planned to write up blog posts and just publish them all once the show was finished.

As they say, the best laid plans...................

Needless to say, there are no blog posts for the cake I entered last weekend.  I do have some in-process photos to show, and of course the end result.  I am starting another cake that is for a show the end of April, and am really going to try to take photos and write up a post each day to be published after the show.

So, without  further ado...........

I took a class a few months ago on how to do cakes in the Nirvana style.  I was inspired by the class, and decided to design my own (hopefully unique) Nirvana cake for my next competition.  I decided on a scallop theme to the cake, rather than the traditional straight or curved collars.  My idea was to do some piping or brush embroidery on the cake itself, that would show through the openings in the side panels of the cake.

If you've never heard of Nirvana style before, it is a cake that is surrounded by run-sugar collars and side panels.

Here is my hand drawing of what the sides were going to look like:

 

This is how they came out, not too bad!!

Then I put on the bottom collar, side panels and one of the top collars (there are two total):

I then put on the top collar (thankfully hiding my bad flooding, lol!), and did some embellishing to it:

Here's a close-up of the sides:

I added small daisies, piped leaved, and shimmer dust to it.

Here's the finished product!!

It had a large gumpaste daisy on top, along with gumpaste leaves, and small daisies on the collar.

My cake was entered in the Professional Division, Special Techniques Category, and won a First Place Ribbon! 

A Bevy of Cake Activity!

So starts the next flurry of cake show activity!

I'm telling you, my life is either completely boring or so packed it's crazy!

Here's what going on for the next few months:
Feb 4-5: Cake show in NJ, dropping off a birthday cake to my cousin in CT on the way own Fri morning
Feb 12th: Another cousin's kid's birthday, this time in NH
Feb19-20: Cake weekend with friends
Feb 26: Connecticut Cake Show, Hartford CT
Feb 27: ICES Mtg in VT, that I may or may not go to.  If not, the cake show in CT continues today also.
March 5th: Cake for friend's son's birthday party, here at home
March 10-13: ICES Mid Year Meeting in Reno, NV
March 19-20: ICES Meeting in Tewksbury, MA
March 26-27: National Capital Cake Show in Annandale VA
April 30-May 1: Great American Cake Show in Westminster MD

Not entering a cake in CT, I don't think I have enough time.  Entering a cake in VA, but not sure what I'm doing yet.  Entering a wedding cake in MD, have the idea all set in my head, but have to start working on it.

As per the last competition, I'll post updates on how things are going according to my plan, but will not be posting any pictures throughout the process, lest one of the judges be reading this.  I will type up a post each day with that days shenanigans, but will refrain from publishing it until the competition is over.  Sorry for that, but since the judges are supposed to be impartial, and you never know who is reading your blog, I feel that I have to act accordingly.

Is your life crazy right now?

~Chelle

Pictures - Finally!!!!

Ok, so I thought I had posted a blog entry with the final pictures of the two cakes.  It appears as though I didn't, however, lol. 

So, without further ado, here they are: