Wow. My oldest son is turning 13 this weekend. He requested a square gift box, 3 tiered, chocolate with coffee buttercream icing and black fondant with white ribbon birthday cake.

I'd never made, worked with or even tasted fondant before. I told him this and he said he diidn't care if it didn't turn out, he just wanted me to try because he loves my cakes.

So over the last few weeks I've been attending the School of CC Forums and the School of You Tube. 've made MMF twice and practiced rolling it out and applying it to a cake. Nothing special, just a single layer cake no decor.

So tonight I make the MMF for his cake, I decided to do chocolate MMF for the first time so I wouldn't have to use so much black colorant. I've also never made such a large batch before. It didn't go quite as planned. I thought I would use more 10X with the chocolate and extra extracts but somehow it turned out REALLY dry and I had to add crisco by the handful.

It all came out in the end with lots of kneading but wow. What I expected to take about 20mins took me about an hour and made a HUGE mess, plus used twice the ingredients expected. So now I completely understand the whole "don't sell yourself short" pricing mentality for you professionals.

The party is Sunday so I'm excited to soon be able to post pics of my 1st "real" fondant cake...even if it is lopsided and sad

It's not sad! It's your first cake with MMF. You're learning and that's great. That's we're all doing on here! We're looking forward to seeing your cake!

Personally, I think that we are our own worst critics. Every time I make a cake, I see all the little flaws and it drives me nuts. But to everyone else, they think it's great. =o) I'm sure it's the same with you as well!

The only way to learn new techniques is to just dive in there and do it. Don't apologize and just go for it! It will get faster and easier with experience!

One of my pet peeves is when an employee isn't comfortable to take a risk and try unknown things...they usually don't last long!!

I think it's wonderful that your son requested that! He must really appreciate your talent to be so specific and still okay if it doesn't turn out. He believes in you so you should too! Can't wait to see pics.

Chocolate will dry/thicken items... so if anything err of the side of LESS powdered sugar next time! Good luck!

Thanks ladies for the advice and encouragement! I'm excited to try my hand at this and learn.

KoryAK- What a surprise that was. I did use cocoa powder, but also melted chocolate and chocolate extract and yet it was drier. I'm sure there's some scientific explanation. I will def use less powdered sugar next time