I've been asked to make a cake for a 25th wedding anniversary, but she wants the cake to have a 'timeline'.

On this timeline she wants certain items placed, such as the year her children were born and other memorable events. One memory in particular that I'm struggling with is their trip to New York. I was thinking of using landmarks such as the statue of liberty

Any ideas of how to go about this??? Or any ideas on how to portray a timeline on a cake?

ok..first thought, instead of one cake...a whole series of smaller cakes laid out in order along a line of icing. (they can argue over who gets to eat what --- "I want Liberty's torch!!")

yes, Statue of Liberty or a BIG red APPLE would work for New York

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sketch option:

can do big sheet cake.
line can run across middle or on diagonal as skecthed.

call out "flags" w/ images for the important dates.
Images can be either FBTC, edible, or freehand.

I like the idea of smaller cakes laid together. Let's take it a step farther --

A series of small cakes, perhaps on stands of different height, using stairs and bridges to create the time line. The cakes themselves can be used for major milestones - wedding, children, retirement(?), while stairs and bridges can be used for other subjects, vacations, new homes, etc.

Chocolate molds can be used to symbolize things like the Statue of Liberty, Eiffel Tower if they were in France, sombreros for Mexico, chocolate baby buggies representing children. Chocolate molds can be used to cast other food items, like fondant and gumpaste. You must treat them with cornstarch first, so the castings do not stick to the plastic.

Theresa

msbask did a great one with the game of life on the cake. she has a picture posted here I found it with a search of the word life.

Thanks for all your input...

I do like the idea of a series of smaller cakes but the cake is to feed 200+ so not sure if this will be feasible. I will give this more thought. I also like the idea of joining them with bridges or steps as I like to make my cakes more 3 dimensional.

Doug - great idea with the BIG APPLE, why didn't I think of that

I searched for msbask's 'game of life' and found it to be effective and simple to achieve - thanks!

This sounds a lot like the Life Quilt cakes I make for birthdays...very simple to make it for an anniversary. I made 2 half sheet (12x1 cakes (to serve 100 people) for a 50th Anniversary, the topics progressed from one cake to the other. You could make two 2-layer half sheets to serve 200 people, or a 2-layer full sheet.

Here is a link to a search on my website for the Life Quilt Cakes. I hope something inspires you. The possibilities are endless as to what you put on each "quilt square."

http://www.sugarfrosted.com/thumbnails.php?album=search&type=full&search=Life+quilt