My First Wedding/cake! Thank You Everyone!
Decorating By BellaDonna Updated 18 Apr 2006 , 2:07pm by erimsy
Well, my daughter's wedding was yesterday. As some of you may know, I volunteered to make the cake for her about 2 weeks before the wedding. For the most part I have only made "regular" cakes, never anything close to a wedding cake, and I've got to tell you, I have a whole new found appreciation for those who do this and do it well. I also understand why wedding cakes cost so much! And I"m here to tell you, they are worth every penny. It was way more work that I had imagined, but worth it in the end. I could have NEVER have done it without the help of those on this board! THANK YOU!
And here it is!...................
BTW, it was a butter cake made with the enhanced cake recipe, with an almond custard filling and white buttercream frosting.
You'd never know it was your first! Great job!
Congratulations on both your daughter's wedding and your first wedding cake. You did an outstanding job...very beautiful 
Wow! 
Thank you everyone! I am overwhelmed by your responses. You guys are all the inspiration for this project. You all should be commended!
Some have asked some questions in this post and some others have sent me PM's asking questions as well so I will try to answer some of those questions. I'm flattered anyone even wants to know!
OK, here goes..
How much buttercream?
A LOT! 
LOL, actually, since I used a custard filling in between the layers, there wasnt as much used as there could have been. I made 2 ½ batches of the recipe that I used which came out to 160 oz. Or 1.25 gallons.
Some tips I learned (mostly from this site) on how to execute a project like this:
1. Dowling All tiers except for the very top tier were doweled individually. I believe I used 5 dowels on the bottom tier, 4 dowels on the next tier, and 3 dowels on the 2nd tier. I also inserted a 3/8 dowel down through the very center of the cake top to bottom. The dowel was 17, the cake was 18. I sharpened the end of the dowel with a utility knife until it was pointy like a spear. I then inserted it in the center of the cake and hammered it in until it penetrated all the cake boards. I would have never thought to do that unless I had seen that posted here.
2. Ribbon I measured the diameter of each cake pan with a measuring tape and then added 1. I then cut the ribbon to size. Prior to wrapping the cake with the ribbon, I cut a piece of wax paper about a ½ wider than the ribbon and then wrapped the cake with it. I then wrapped the cake with the ribbon and secured it with a pink hatpin. The purpose of the wax paper is to keep the oil from your buttercream frosting from bleeding through to your ribbon. Again, another tip learned right here.
3. I used a custard pudding in between the layers, but NOT the tiers. I piped a thick stream of icing using a 1A tip. Initially I was not going to use a custard/pudding filling in between the layers because I was concerned that the custard would squish out from the weight, as has been my previous experience. I learned that by piping this barrier around the rim of the cake, it keeps the custard in.
4. Crumb Coating Until 1 week and a ½ ago I couldnt have told you what this was. I crumb coated the whole cake prior to actually icing it to help catch any crumbs and prevent them from getting into the icing and thereby being seen in the finished product. It works!
5. I used Magic Strips and a flower nail in my 12 and 10 pans to keep them from turning too brown on the outside and make sure the centered cooked evenly. It worked beautifully, however I do not like the Magic Strips. THEY STINK WHEN YOU BAKE THEM! Some have giving tips for making your own with fabric and aluminum foil. I think I will try it. Do a search on this board for info how to.
Gosh! I think thats it! As you can see, as far as the decorations go, I kinda took the easy way out. The only icing decorating that I did was around the very top layer. It just goes to show you, you can make/bake/decorate a beautiful cake without using tips. While I am eager to learn how to do that, this was just too much to do for a first timer. I cant even imagine how much more time it would have taken me if I had made all the flowers myself and not bought silks.
Thanks again to everyone who was even interested in hearing about how this cake was created. I am suffering from a little bit of Cake Tramatization 
so I dont think youll be seeing any new cake posts from me anytime soon 
but I am still hanging around to learn so when I do, Ill be good to go!
absolutely beautiful. that's a big task for the mother of bride to take on. i'm waiting for my sister to get married so i can do a wedding cake! wouldn't want to try one on someone i didn't know
Beautiful cake, wouldn't know it was your first one!
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