I have decided to no longer make cakes.
I have found that cake making in the place I live holds no future, as there is no call for them.
I also have lost my confidence in the cakes that I have produced, I mean, who would actually pay money for them anyway?

I am not qualified in baking or decorating, my background isn't cakes, its art.

So I am bidding fair well to the cake world, the mountains I tried to climb were too great and I failed.

Goodbye to all the true bakers and cake decorates I spoke to these last few months.

Well its back to the day job.

Goodbye

JamAndButtercream x

Good luck in your "other" life and hope you find success! Darn it- I WILL master this sugar stuff even if it kills me... like trying to get a golf round under par for some, I guess.

Sorry it didn't work out for you.

I have no desire to bake for a living, not as a main paying job. It just isn't what I want in my life, because for me now, cakes are fun. I get to pick and choose, and I get to make the cakes I want to make, when they fit in to my schedule. I don't have to give up every weekend to be dealing with cakes.

The cakes I do are for family and friends, and thankfully they respect me and I never have to deal with cake drama when it comes to them.

If it brings you no joy, then step back, but I wouldn't get rid of all your stuff yet. You may find a time when you want to pick it back up. Or maybe you haven't found your niche in the cake world yet.

Sometimes it is peaceful to step back and do what we truly love.

Hi Guys,
Thankyou for your replies, Lately I'm getting these weird bouts of feeling really low and depressed, its not nice

I get times when I feel as if I can do lots of things, but I'm not really good at any of them

I feel as if I'm standing in a cross roads and I don't really know which way to go.
I hope I get over these feelings soon and work out what to do.........

Thanks guys.............

I hope you work them out as well. As I said before, hold on to your stuff for a little while. Even if cakes isn't a business adventure you may still find you want it as a hobby.

*hugs*

Thankyou for your kind words

Hi Everyone,
So I posted this a couple of days ago when I was feeling a bit low and depressed, since then I feel a lot better, I haven't shaken off the depression problem completely yet, but its getting better, I LOVE this website, I haven't made a cake for a while and I'm happy to say I'm back in the game!

The first thing I want to make is halloween cake pops!

Glad that you are sticking with it

Have fun with your Halloween cake pops

@augurey
Thanks! Halloween is my favourite holiday, and they will be practise ones, so I'm going to try ghosts, skulls, vampires, werewolfs, loads of different ones!

I think we all go thru this from time to time. The best thing for you to do was to step back and forget about making cakes for a while. I do that too. Then I see a design I would like to try, and i'm back in. So I totally understand where you are coming from, and am glad you are getting the desire to start again.

Yeah, it's funny because I say to my family and friends quite a lot that I'm going to quit lots of things that I do, but I'm not a quitter! My family know that I don't give up, even though I say I'm going to!

I said days ago that I was never making cakes again, blah, blah......
and here I am again!............and this time I'm staying!

Ummm...slightly off the topic, but where are you on the menopause train? Just arriving....or has it even left the station yet? Reason I'm asking is if you're getting depressed now and then, it very well could be your hormones acting up. Perimenopause can start as early as your 30's and with it comes all kinds of fun things...depression, anxiety, mood swings that make PMS look like a walk in the park, fuzzy thinking, insomnia...and more!

It may be a reason you're feeling the way you do.

I agree with others here that you need to look upon this as a fun hobby and not a business...at least not yet. Give yourself time to develop and learn from every cake you make without stressing about meeting a customer's demands.

@carmijok

............well I wasn't expecting the menopause this early!..............................................I'm 22!

If I did cakes for a living it would be NO FUN!! As with Texas Sugar, I pick and choose when to do them,
I LOVE being a critical care nurse. Would never give that up, plus the pay aint bad either!

At least I feel like I'm not alone on this site. I've had this feeling too lately and decided to give it a rest for a while. I work another job and then just took up making cakes on the side for family and friends. It really took over every spare minute of my life this year and I just feel burnt out. The fun is kind of being sucked right out of it for me. I'm giving myself a couple months off and see how I feel afterwards. Maybe we just need to step back once in a while. Good luck!

@carmijok

@bakingatthebeach yeah even though I like making cakes I think I'd get sick of it, if it was a full time job at the moment!

@olleharr Thankyou, and good luck to you too, hope you feel better too!

Aw I've only just seen this thread! I'm glad you've decided not to throw in the towel just yet. Do you decorate often? It definitely doesn't necessarily have to become a business, I only decorate for friends and family! You have such awesome ideas, all it takes is practice practice practice. My big 'can't do it' thing is piping. SOOOOOOOOO difficult! Lol.

It might just be you were having one of those days, but I get pretty depressed around this time of year because I get that seasonal affective disorder. Basically meaning the lack of light in the winter makes you depressed. This is one of the worst times because the summer sunlight has suddenly gone and I need to adjust to that. The other bad time is towards the beginning of spring because its been winter and dull for so long. I don't know if you relate to that anyway. Do you have a Facebook? If you do add me! www.facebook.com/home.php?refid=7#!/profile.php?refid=7

Hi Jennifer!
Yeah I'm not packing it in yet! I don't decorate all the time, and it is just family cakes, I'm also on a diet at the moment so baking a big cake for no occasion wouldn't really help!

I don't think I get seasonal affective disorder because I prefer the winter to the summer! (I LOVE snow! )

Thankyou for the facebook offer but unfortunately I'm not on facebook..........I know it sounds ridiculious for a 22 year old girl, but I've always been different!

I have looked at your cakes that you have posted on here, and I think they are really good. I think you are very talented. I am my own worst critique. I can have compliments left and right, but because I know where the "boo boo's" are, and what I could have done differently, then that bothers me. Even tho I know they are good, I know the flaws, but as long as no one else knows, then I have done my job.

Im so glad you have decided not to back out of cake decorating yet. I also do not do this for a living, its on the side for extra money, and for fun. Its my "hobby' per say. Everything I have learned, I have taught myself, so I know my cakes are not "perfect", but thats what gives them character. They are my cakes with my signature making style on them.

I also suffer from depression. One thing I have learned when it gets bad, is to never quit anything when Im having one of my depression bouts. you dont think rationally and all decisions are made based on your feelings, which are temporary. Never quit unless you can think rationally and clearly, You dont want to regret something you did on a whim. And never get rid of your cake making supplies, incase you do stop again, because their may be a time, like what just happened, you will find that passion again, and will want to do it. and then you dont have to spend all that money again to restart what you already had.

I went through the same thing last year, wanting to stop, even for family, not putting my heart into it at all. Im sooo glad I didnt, I just "stepped away" for awhile. I am back, and with vengance, and feel I am better than I have ever been, trying new things, etc. So,, GOOD FOR YOU for coming back, and finding that passion again to do this, and to try new things. I cannot wait to see your cake pops. That is also my next adventure, along with cupcakes.. )

Hugs.

I have looked at your cakes that you have posted on here, and I think they are really good. I think you are very talented. I am my own worst critique. I can have compliments left and right, but because I know where the "boo boo's" are, and what I could have done differently, then that bothers me. Even tho I know they are good, I know the flaws, but as long as no one else knows, then I have done my job.

Im so glad you have decided not to back out of cake decorating yet. I also do not do this for a living, its on the side for extra money, and for fun. Its my "hobby' per say. Everything I have learned, I have taught myself, so I know my cakes are not "perfect", but thats what gives them character. They are my cakes with my signature making style on them.

I also suffer from depression. One thing I have learned when it gets bad, is to never quit anything when Im having one of my depression bouts. you dont think rationally and all decisions are made based on your feelings, which are temporary. Never quit unless you can think rationally and clearly, You dont want to regret something you did on a whim. And never get rid of your cake making supplies, incase you do stop again, because their may be a time, like what just happened, you will find that passion again, and will want to do it. and then you dont have to spend all that money again to restart what you already had.

I went through the same thing last year, wanting to stop, even for family, not putting my heart into it at all. Im sooo glad I didnt, I just "stepped away" for awhile. I am back, and with vengance, and feel I am better than I have ever been, trying new things, etc. So,, GOOD FOR YOU for coming back, and finding that passion again to do this, and to try new things. I cannot wait to see your cake pops. That is also my next adventure, along with cupcakes..

Hugs.

@Lamcakes

Thankyou for your reply and kind words, you are right about not doing something on a whim when one of these moods suddenly appear.

You know I think you're right about stepping back for a while and then when the depression lifts, you feel as if you want to come back stronger!

Normally I'm a happy person and definately not a quitter, I also see the funny side to things, I actually just graduated in stop motion animation! and comedy is totally my thing! Did you see that pink blob cake in my gallery??? Its in the disaster gallery, I laughed myself stupid at that!

I'm going to make my cake pops this week and hopefully they will turn out right, if they don't I'll post in the forum saying If you need a laugh, take a look at my third attempt at cake pops!!

Thankyou again and *HUGS* back!

@jennifercullen

They probably described them like that because they're like blending the cake up and then adding chocolate or butter or cream cheese to it, I've made them twice before, the first time there was way too much butter in them, not enough chocolate and they were really greasy Second time I added a tiny bit of butter and more chocolate and they tasted good, this time I gonna try a recipe where it uses cream cheese to bring the mixture together, so I'll see how they go, I've got a cake pops book, called "Pop Bakery" by Clare O'Connell, which has recipes and different ways to decorate them, so should be fun!

You need a cake buddy!

I had/have a fab friend that we shared cake everything together. We had so much fun taking classes together and our friendship blossomed from there.

Find a local class nearby and join in the fun. I'm in East Anglia and our local college offers classes. I've had the best fun with my group of ladies, we started coming back each term just to hang out and have more cake fun.

Get your cake buddy and get to Birmingham for the huge cake convention coming up!

I'm sorry you feel like that
I'm a hobby baker and I mostly do cakes for fun. However, I'm sure that if 'caking' was my full time job I would probably not like it as much!

@Cake4ever

Thanks for the idea!

@Rosie2

Yeah I think it would apply to most things, if you did any of your hobbies full time you'd get sick of it!