This is longer than I intended, but I'm venting. Apologies in advance ...

A friend of mine wanted a small cake to celebrate the 1st anniversary of dating her BF. But she didn't want a big one, because it's just for the two of them. So, I came up with the idea of making a small double heart cake, covered in fondant and some writing on it. She didn't want it to look too "Valentiney", so the fondant colour was Hot Pink, and the writing in Black. Twisted black shoestring licorce around the bottom. Bob's your uncle, right? WRONG!

This little cake, which should have taken me no more than an hour to decorate, took 3 hours! Cake baked fine; I used my large heart cookie cutter, cut out 4 shapes; made hot pink strawberry BC to torte with. Fondant coloured and rolled out wonderfully.

Now comes the frustration. The crumb coat wouldn't go on easily. It kept pulling cake away when I tried to spread it. I have never had this problem before, and I make the BC exactly the same as usual. Even had the A/C on to keep the kitchen cool. Finally go it covered and let cake and fondant settle for about an hour.

While this was happening, I made an arrow head and feather tail out of GP, suck onto candy sticks. Once dry, I painted them - arrow black and feather brown, and then covered them with white glitter so they'd shine a bit. Left them to dry again.

Went to put the fondant on, nice thickness (which is usually where I mess up), covered nicely. As I was smoothing it, the cake kept slipping underneath it. Finally got that done ... pretty much. IMHO, thou, it didn't look much like two hearts, more one top bumpy blob. (But we are our own worst critics, aren't we.)

Went to start writing on it, in black gel. BIG MISTAKE! The space was so small that the gel started to merge before I got the 2nd word finished. She wanted "Happy Second 1st Anniversary" (it's the second time they've dated, so it was a little joke between them). Had to wipe that all off, clean off the black (using a damp paper towel), dust it with PS to dry it out. Start again with some black icing that I had (in the tube from Wilton) and a #3 tip. In script - "Happy Second 1st" came out fine ... "Anniversary" took me 3 tries, because it wouldn't fit across the dang cake! I ended up doing that in printing, and was going to go back and remove the script to rewrite in printing, but it had been on the cake too long and the black had soaked into the hot pink fondant. THEN, I notice that 'Second' is on an angle, not straight to match 'Happy'. ARGH!!

I finally had to accept defeat, and left it as it was.

THEN, I had to wrap the black licorce around the bottom. Ran a thread of the BC around the bottom, and started to twist and wrap. Ever tried to twist licorce and get it to stay twisted? I used a food bag clip to keep the ends attached while I pushed it into the BC. It was longer than I needed, so when I trimmed it, the ends I had clipped didn't touch the cake. Tuck the ends under each other on the back, only to turn it around and find a string had broken. I'm about ready to cry! Deep breaths, and I just tucked the broken licorce back in and under the good ones.

Quick check around, remove any BC showing under the licorce as best I can, into the box, put arrow head and tail into a Ziploc bag, set beside the cake, close box and walk away.

This, by far, was the worst cake I've ever done. I didn't even take a picture of it, and I take pictures of all my cakes. I just wanted it out of my house! (I delivered it today.)

I will never do anything so small ever again. Give me a 6 teired topsy turvy first!

a fabulous illustration on why "Less is more ..... WORK!" and why we charge more for small cakes!

Right Indy! And why I charge highly for mine....and do a lot, might I add! I LOVE little cakes!

Oh nightmare - have a drink and a sleep and live to "frost another day!"
(I stole that from another post -thought it was funny!)