This is absolutely ridiculous.
My birthday is on monday and Ive been working on my birthday cake.
Yesterday I made my first batch of toba's fondant and it came out great.
The cake was going to be a 8" round and a 6" round stacked- my first attempt at a stacked cake.
I generally make cakes from scratch and never have a problem.
Yesterday I made 3 cakes ( all from the same recipe I always use) and thye all came out crap- 1 hard as a brick literally (this one was actually supposed to be both cakes but the batter deflated and barely made the 6".
The other never rose more than half way normal and then turned hard.
Went out and bought more eggs and sugar etc last night.
Tried again this morning.
This morning my 2 other attempts came out slightly better but not great _ I only got half of the 8".
So I broke down and made an extended french vanilla from box mix and it seems ok- came out perfectly level and fluff (only made 1 8" round- Im gonna try to salvage the 6" from this morning)
I made my first batch of royal icing and it came out great.
Now im just so frustrated with everything that I dont even want to make the cake anymore.
I still got to make my mixed berry filling- which I don't think will go w/ the french vanilla cake now- way too sweet.
so now i gotta figure out what kind of filling to put in it.
im just so sick of it i dont want to do it anymore
oh and to top it off the luster dust I ordered wont get here on time for my cake 
that sounds like my birthday cake for this year....the cake came out fine but when it came to decorating it...i don't want to even talk about it. But taking a break from it and coming back might help..i took a nap lol 
thanks for the empathy
I took your advice last night
I cleaned everything up- I wrapped up the salvageable cakes. and walked away
I did laundry, cleaned up, ate dinner and went to bed
gonna start fresh today.
now i have to decide wether to keep these cakes or bake some fresh ones.
Im not sure I like the taste of the french vanilla- very sweet. maybe if I counter it w/ some chocolate ganache
Your cake will turn out fine.. I am sure of it..French Vanilla goes very well with the berries or even with the chocolate I dont think it is to sweet.. Altough I have to admit I am not a "Scratch" girl. but I think vanilla goes good with your origional filling great. Take a break and then have fun making your first stacked cake...don't forget to dowel!
Sorry about all your trouble, sounds like one of my b-days 
Maybe some new baking powder will help,and I think the mixed berry filling will be yummy. I've made french vanilla with a strawberry filling and it tasted like strawberry shortcake,yummy! Don't let it get to you , we all have caketastophes sometimes .Just remember to have a Happy Birthday!!!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU 
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU 
HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR AURYN HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU
Sorry you have to bake your own cake to start with. I'm not very good at it but I would bake you one in a heartbeat if I could. 
Hope everything ends up okay.
Diane[/center]
Thank you for the advice everyone
and the birthday wishes
so far its a pretty great birthday
yourstruly- I took your advice and am turning it into a strawberry shortcake of sorts- the bottom layer that is- its gonna have 2 layers of berries and the middle layer is gonna be the creme patisserie I just made
tnuty- thanks for the dowling reminder.
the luster dust came in the mail at the office of course- so I will cover everything in fondant and apply the luster dust when my mother gets home with it.
I will keep you all updated
thanks for the support
I love you guys
well first
thank you everyone for helping not go ballistic and all the great advice.
I ended up spreading crisco all over 2 sheets of wax paper and managed to roll out the fondant on that.
My pretty blue and red marble fondant was a very stiff not pliable or elastic solid dreary blue by the time i got it on the cake.
I didnt even try smoothing anything out.
I managed to stack the cakes and brush on some luster dust and stick them in the fridge to firm up for an our.
the bottom cake had bulged out and was seeping pastry cream by the time we cut it- but it had started doing that when I had first put the fillings in- bad edge judgment on my part- I put the fondant dam too close to the edge.
everyone loved the taste. They thought it was pretty
I thought it looked like crap but it tasted good.
Im not very happy w/ the way it looked so I doubt all post the pic
I just wanted to say thank you to everyone for helping me out in my basket case moment
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