My son's 1st birthday party is sunday and I plan on decorating the old Thomas the Train cake. I am using the crisco and butter BC recipe and I would LOVE to have some tips. Should I make the icing and let it crust in the bowl before decorating the cake? How can I make sure my stars look great and that there are no spaces between them? Any other tips would be greatly appreciated.. BTW, I am using a DH yellow cake mix.

Hi Amaydak,
Welcome to CC. You'll love it here. Very addicting.

You don't need to let your bc crust in the bowl it'll crust fine on the cake.
As far as your stars you do your row of stars and the next row down are
done against and between the other row.

* * * * *
* * * *
Something like that but they're all touching. Did I confuse you even more?
I think I confused myself.
Well this will bump you up and maybe someone else can explain better.

Hi Amaydak -

My daughter's first birthday party is tomorrow (Saturday)! I did her cake today (will be posting pictures this weekend) and had such a blast! She loves butterflies (and a bunch of other bugs) so we went with that for a theme.

I did a butterfly cake a month or so so ago in my Wilton 1 class and have one big suggestion - get the tip with the 3 stars on it. It'll save you a BUNCH of time!

Congrats and have fun!

RE: making stars.....my ...when you are making them after a while you start getting tired. I always say for each star. squeee, stop pull. and don't go too fast. I now it's dorky but it works. have you condsidered the Triple star tip??? Be sure you are also consistant with your pressure contol.
Good Luck

I find that when I start getting tired or the icing starts to get too soft...stop, rest, put the piping bag in the fridge for a few minutes to cool it back down then go back. If I start going too fast or my icing gets too warm from my hands, the stars start looking sloppy and not as crisp.