OMG......I started my wilton course I .....its soo exciting!! But i actually spent more than what i expected being the first class! we were required alot of supplies......BUt it should all be worth it!!

Is there anyone out there taking classes? any advice!!????

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I've taken courses I, II, and fondant and gumpaste and half way into course III. I was pretty much clueless but was immediately hooked and I look forward to each class. I agree with all the new things that you have to buy, but I enjoy shopping for each class and getting new toys to play with. I just pace myself with shopping and usually every saturday i'm buying sutff for the class that week, and usually there is a couple weeks between each session(at least out here) so i'm able to grab what I need. Oh, and coupons, coupons are your friends. It makes a big difference. Well i think thats it for now, just continue to have fun.

Why do you think Wilton offers courses!

I don't know if anyone or everyone realizes or not, but when I get emailed a coupon, or get a coupon off of Cake Central, I copy and paste it to fill a full page, then I save it on my pc until it expires. Then I print at least 2 pages worth all at once, cut them and place them in my CM (Creative Memories) photo file!

It makes a great coupon organizer!
I will even take my husband with me to the store, so that he can use 2 coupons, and I can use 2 coupons. Michael's where we live allows 1 michael's coupon and one JoAnn's coupon in one transaction. I think our JoAnn's allows one JoAnn's coupon and one Michael's coupon too.

So you have to continue to find all the coupons you can.
My Mother in Law gives me all of hers too, which is very kind.
I Hope that helps you out a bit?!

PS: I'm currently taking Course 3.

My birds turned out great! I made about 12 of them, because I had so much color flow icing left over. I also invented my own flower power type of flowers and made a bunch of those. They resembled the Austin Powers look. I'm not excited about the fondant roses, though. How are yours going? How many do we have to make for our final Course 3 cake?

I'm taking course I now. I'm one class in and was hoping for more out of the instructor. He didn't teach us much in the first course, so I'm hoping this Wednesday night will be better. I bought the 101 piece thing to make life easier in the future. Michaels now has online coupons each week, so just google that and save a bunch. Are you enjoying the class???

I just started Course 1 last Tuesday, and we didn't do much of anything other than watch her decorate a cake, talk about baking cakes, and making buttercream. Tomorrow is our second class, and we're bringing a cake and our extra buttercream so we can learn different techniques.

I just finished frosting my cake to take tomorrow night, and dh came in and asked what I was doing with Viva towels lol. He laughed when I said I didn't want to see any streaking on my cake and he said the class was to learn how to decorate, not to one up the other novices lol. I'm really excited about actually getting to do something tomorrow night!

I am - FINALLY - taking the Wilton courses. I am doing courses I, II, III and Fondant & Gum Paste this month. Currently on week 2 for all of them. Couldn't fit in Gum Paste Flowers this month *sigh*. Oh well, gives me something to look forward to for next month! For my final cake for course 3 I am looking at needing about 30 flowers.

I use the Michael's coupons for any supplies I don't have already. I finally broke down and bought a toolbox to drag all this stuff to the classes.

I have 2 different instructors for my classes, as I am taking them at 2 different Michael's stores. My instructor for course 1 is more "by-the-book" than my instructor for the other classes. We did the rainbow cake tonight doing star tips and piping gel pattern transfer. MUCH easier than what I've been doing all these years!

The instructor for all the other courses is defintely more free-flowing and artistic, we didn't even do color flow this week like we were supposed to. I think we might do it next week. She pretty much lets us pick what we want to do for projects and we choose whatever design we want for our final cakes, while incorporating the actual how-to's in. It's pretty cool.

Just finished Course I and loved it! I am now taking Course II. Sunday will be my third week and I am so excited to learn all of the different flowers!! Can't wait to take Course III and IV!

I had much of the same with class one - talking about cakes, watching him decorate a cake and make buttercream. Definitely did not follow the book. We didn't learn about coloring or filling bags or anything like that. I have to decorate my cake tomorrow for my class tomorrow night. I'll let you know how week 2 goes! let me know how yours is!

Hi Maralin,

I just completed Course I and I loved it! My roses are still pretty sad but class is so much fun. I look forward to it every week! Tonight I start Course II and I just can't wait for 6:30.

My cake skills are novice at BEST, but I know just from starting the course, my skills have tripled from what I was doing a month ago. Keep at it. This is one hobby/profession where the only thing that will make you better is a little instruction and a LOT of practice!

Yeah, my guy told us, "Don't worry about bringing in three icings. Just bring in the medium." I just think it matters A LOT who is teaching your class. I definitely want to take all of the courses, but I'm thinking I may take the next one at JoAnnes so I can have a different instructor. Who knows? Maybe I'll go Wednesday night and it will be a totally different story and I will love it! I have 8 people in my class.

That was my thought exactly! He is the only one that teaches the Course I, so I'm going to have to pray it gets better, practice an awful lot on my own, and take the remaining courses somewhere else. =( Thank God for this site!

Don't give up if you feel you haven't learned much. Try another instructor, as in any class, the instructor can make it or break it. They are supposed to be following the book, adding extras is great as long as the main lesson is followed.
As far as your Course 1, lesson 1, it is so very important even though there isn't any hands on, you are learning how to prepare your cake, torte it and ice it smoothly. No matter how good your decorating skills are your cake won't look professional if you start with crooked or roughly iced cake. Another important point, read your book, the information and instruction there is invaluable.

That's what I have had to rely on so far - reading my book on my own. I've made and leveled cakes in the past, so I'm good with that part. I really want to learn the decorating and stuff. He just kind of quickly iced his cake without really explaining anything (because by then we were down to about 5 minutes of class left because he had spent the first hour and a half talking about himself...). It wasn't smooth. And his wasn't level because he used the Wilton leveler and didn't double check to make sure both ends were even. It was impressive...

I thought the wilton courses were awesome! I miss them so much because it is the only time I really got to do cakes! I too bought sooooooo much stuff, but it is so much fun. It has been a while and I feel like I forgot some stuff, may actually take course 2 over again! cause I forgot how to do some of the RI flowers!

I agree. I'm curious to see how often i'll actually do cake since I won't really HAVE to

I just started Course I. There was a lot of talking in the first class..and she demonstrated how to ice a cake. Then took us to the cake isle and showed us all of the products. I'm taking my class at Hobby Lobby. They have a coupon running thru Fri or Sat for 40% off of ALL Wilton products!! And pretty much all of the competitors take each others coupons. (I used them at Hobby Lobby and Michael's) We are supposed to bring an iced cake to class Tues to decorate the "rainbow cake". I'm pretty excited and need to start taking pictures so hopefully I will notice some improvement!

I had Course I Class 2 last night. It was a little better. He still repeated his life story the first 40 minutes, but then we actually got to decorate. We didn't do the rainbow cake - just practiced dots, stars, writing, etc. But at least we did SOMETHING.

I'm between Wilton Courses II & III b/c of the 'rule change' and we didn't have 4 ready to go for course III . I understand that $ is tight and they need to make sure there's a need/want for the class, but we had 3 who wanted to go onto course III. Hopefully it'll start up next month.

I feel like I learned a good bit from the first 2 courses. I knew nothing about decorating and have no natural artistic talent so the more I practice on my own, the better things turn out. I loved my instructor. Nice balance of by the book and going with the flow of our group as well as demonstrating to each of us individually and watching us work and giving feedback.

I have to agree. If you aren't happy with your instructor, move on to a different place once this course is over. My instructor was absolutely amazing, such a talented cake decorator and so patient! There were just certain things I couldn't do, still can't do, like buttercream roses!, but it is just a deficiency of mine! I feel so lucky to have been taught by her. I just thought I would get some average employee of the store or something. Hopefully things will work out and you can find a new instructor elsewhere. Good luck!

It drives me absolutely nuts. I'm REALLY type-A personality, so it's extremely frustrating. I definitely want to take the rest of the courses...but with someone else. Do they ask you to review the instructor at the end or anything? I'd love to be able to read reviews of other instructors at other locations before signing up.