Simple Groom Cake

I also made this Groom Cake for my daughter's wedding. It was very simple. I made a two layer cake using 14" pans which I covered it with buttercream as well as a single layer 6" cake. I used a sheet of black foam to make the tuxedo. I cut each top edge to make the "V" when it was put on the cake. I then attached it with buttercream, added black fondant buttons and a bow.

I cringe when I look at the top of the cake! I do a much better job of smoothing the icing now. This cake and the wedding cake in the previous cake were made just a few months after I completed the Wilton cake decorating course.

Sparkly Blue & Silver Wedding Cake

This cake was made for my daughter's wedding by my sister-in-law and myself. It was my first attempt at a wedding cake and I was overwhelmed!! I would not recommend the mother of the bride doing the wedding cake if she is also coordinating the wedding! I had previously arranged for help if I needed it and I did! I baked the cake, made the decorative arrangements, and iced the bottom two layers. My sister-in-law then took over and iced the rest of the cake, put it together and added the arrangements and ribbon. A real joint effort!

The bottom layer was a home-made marble cake recipe that wanted to fall apart. The other layers were made from box cake mixes, and all were frozen beforehand. The wedding was blue and silver and we had some trouble getting the right shade of blue but it turned out pretty close. The arrangements were made out of floral picks which I picked up on chearance at Michael's and Hobby Lobby after Christmas. I made these well ahead of time.

I used 16", 14", 12" and6" inch pans. I had intended to use smaller plates for the two top layers so they wouldn't show, but I failed to explain what I wanted to do to my sister-in-law, so the plates were showing. However, using smaller plates may have created a balance problem, so that may be the only way it would work.

As I said, I was overwhelmed by this experience, and it scared me off making any more wedding cakes - until now, two and a half years later! I'll let you know how my next experience goes.

Simple Flower Cake

Here's another cake I made for another granddaughter's birthday this summer!

With this party, there was no theme other than bright-colored napkins and plates with a vibrant balloon design. I had a short amount of time to decorate, so I went to the store with an open mind. These vibrant flowers jumped out at me so I bought them on impulse thinking I could incorporate them somehow with the table decorations. This is what I came up with instead.

With a cake like this, you could use several different colors of plates and napkins separately or mixed together.

This cake was made using a ten inch cake for the bottom and a six inch cake for the top. I used the push-in type pillars for the top layer. Both cakes were iced with standard white buttercream icing. I put a shell border around the bottom of both cakes, though you couldn't see it after I added the flowers. I used ribbon in coordinating colors on each layer to finish it off.

This is just another idea of a simple cake a beginner decorator can put together rather quickly.

Simple Polka Dot Cake

Here's a cake I made this summer for my granddaughter's first birthday party. The theme was multi-colored polka dots and she's always dressed frilly and wearing big bows with those fuzzy little feather things in them. So I combined the two and came up with this design.

Typically, the dots would be made of fondant, but I was especially busy at that time so I purchased a bucket of foam shapes at Michael's with all different shapes and sizes in every color! It saved me a huge amount of time and nobody cared that it wasn't all edible. I just took the non-edible decorations off as I served it.

Just another example of how you can save a little time without compromising visual appeal!

Simple Flower Pot Cake

I recently made this Flower Pot cake. It turned out alright, but I learned a lot about what not to do!! First of all, when I do it again, I'll use fondant instead of butter cream icing. I prefer using butter cream because I can throw a cake together so quickly with it. For me, fondant takes longer, but with this cake I think it would have turned out much better.

It really wasn't that difficult. I just put together a staked cake, only upside down, and trimmed the cake edges to keep it smooth. I tried to construct a lip around the top by keeping the top layer a little larger than the next layer, but I didn't allow for the icing and it wasn't enough to really notice, so I just smoothed it out.

And I used silk flowers, of course!!

Simple Pumpkin Cake

Here's a picture of a Pumpkin Cake I made for our Thanksgiving Dinner. It's made using two bundt cakes put together. The most difficult part was getting the buttercream icing the right shade of orange!

I used a Marble Cake recipe that I make every Thanksgiving and Christmas. This time I just made two of them, leveled them off, put them together with the Fudge Icing that I then used for a crumb coat. I then iced the whole thing with my orange icing. I added a fondant stem and leaves that I had made a few days ahead of time.

That's it! One of the easiest cakes I've made so far!

If you would like to try it and have questions, just let me know. I'd be glad to help.

Simple Bike Cake

This is a very simple cake, easy for anyone to make and decorate. There's not a lot of work to it. Just make a sheet cake (I used a 12" x 16" pan), ice it with buttercream and use candy for the bike, border and sun. I used three different colors of gift-wrap ribbon, curled slightly, on the handlebars. This cake was made for an eight year old boy. It was not my original design; I got the idea from another cake site and loved it.

It's A Piece of Cake!

I have four children. While they were growing up it was a constant birthday party – or so it seemed! I would just get one party out of the way and it was time for another. I always meant to take classes and learn how to make neat birthday cakes for my kids.

But, alas, that never happened. So we usually bought the birthday cake. I did make the occasional cake, but it usually wasn't much to look at. So after I started having grandchildren and had more time on my hands, I enrolled in Wilton cake decorating classes and fulfilled a dream! Finally!! So now I'm making cakes for my granddaughters' birthdays and great-nieces and great-nephews and anyone else who is willing to let me learn on their cake! I've decided to use my blog as a photo gallery of sorts. Show off my work and give other want-to-be cake decorators some encouragement. Share what I've learned and prove that you can make a cool cake fairly easily.

One of the most important things to keep in mind when doing cakes for kids is that they don't look at every minute detail. Their mom might, but generally, they just look at the shape and see if it's what they asked for. Sometimes they will show you a particular cake and want you to make their's just like it. It's usually pretty easy go do.

In the Wilton classes I took, I learned how to make the fondant and gum paste flowers – they can take hours to make!! And if you charge for your time, a cake can get very pricey very quickly!! So I only do this for the person who is willing to pay for it. Your typical kids' birthday party doesn't usually have that kind of budget! So I don't spend a lot of time on that type of thing.

I said earlier that I now have more time on my hands, but I do have limits!. So I tend to use silk or real flowers instead of spending hours making them. Instead of using fondant for add-ons, I sometimes use foam shapes. You'll see this in future pictures. Just make sure to let your customer know what's edible and what's not!

Using a few shortcuts such as these, you can make really attractive cakes in a relatively short amount of time.