Hello my fellow bakers, just curious to know how long everyone has been baking for and if doing this has been a long life dream or something that came out of the blue.

Over 25 years. Never ever thought about doing cakes until I went with my husband's sister to order her wedding cake. I'm sitting in some lady's living room thinking, "This doesn't look hard!" Bought a book, some bags and tips, taught myself .... and here I am!

So I guess I'm an "Out of the blue" kid!

I'm "out of the blue", too I guess. When I was a teenager and my family was low on money I would just make a boxed cake with colored Betty C frosting for the bdays. Then when my niece's 1st bday came around I made her a Pooh character cake and really that is when I decided I liked doing it. So for me on/off for about 13 years, but only seriously for the last few months. I'd like to do it as a business but I don't have enough confidence in myself.

hehee.. KImmypooh--- I LOVE YOUR AVATAR! Just a few more days until the fourth book!

As for me, I made my first cake for my son's first birthday (1995) and was hooked. I made about three or four cakes a year until three years ago when I started getting requests. Now I'm doing 1 a week. It is my favorite hobby, but also my most demanding and sometimes stressful!

Thinking back---this is toooo funny! My mother took a Wilton course & hated it (she loved doing flowers) It looked like fun to me so I gave it a whirl and loved it. A friend was getting married (no money) asked if my mother & I would do her wedding flowers & cake. We did & whalaa! We were in the wedding business for the next 20 years! That first cake was a doozy but I was sooo proud & I guess we were both oblivious or nuts to do what we did. Blind leading the blind, but it worked & we had a ball & still caking

I learned to decorate when I was 10 years old. I swapped hobbies with a lady. I taught her to crochet and she taught me how to decorate. I wish I could remember her name and find her to say thank you.

I have been decorating for thirty two years and now own my own business.

My sweet husband gave me the Wilton classes as a Christmas present in 2006. I started taking them in Feb. of 2007 and have been adicted ever since! It's all HIS fault we now need a bigger kitchen and more storage space, you know!!

I was raised in a bakery! I'm 23 years old and have been decorating cookies and cakes since I can remember! Here is a picture of me, I think I was 3 years old, decorating cookies!

I just re-read over my last post and I used way too many exclamation points... Sorry guys, its 3am, I'm a little slap happy.

I was always attracted to ake - I even remember coloring pictures of cakes. Took the first class of Wilton 1 in college and decided it was gonna take too much time. Just played around and decorated a cake every now and then. When the military moved us to Germany, I really wanted to get started. Just offered a cake up for a charity auction and started getting business. I make around 3 cakes a week now. Not much, but enough for me!

I don't even remember when I baked my first cake. I do remember it was w/ an easy bake oven though. That was over forty yrs ago, and I've baked ever since. Now as far as doing something more than putting canned frosting on. I've only been doing that a real short time.

Mike

i started a year ago this past august. i think as a teenager i did duncan hines and i never even thought to try and frost a cake smooth. about 15 months ago i decided to make a scratch cake for my daughter's bday and that was that. i've been in business now since march.

ashley

I started about a year and a half ago, after I had my second baby and quit my retail management job I had for 8 years. My mom baked and decorated my birthday cakes when I was little and I always loved it. I just never had the time until recently. I did a couple for family and everything took off from there. Now, I usually do at least a couple a week.

I decided to make my husband's birthday cake last August and loved it so I decided to take the Wilton classes. I took 2 1/2 classes and then dropped out because so many of my friends were asking me to make cakes for them i didn't have time to make them for the class.

I've been hooked ever since.

When I was a little girl, it would visit my aunt who did cakes. I would sit for hours and watch her. Ever since then I have loved baking and cooking in general. My mom says I got all that from my aunt. I still have some of her decorating stuff that came back to me in a round about way. (She's been gone for almost 20 yrs.)

I took the first 2 Wilton Classes many years ago and made my son's BD cakes and such. Then I had a restaurant for a few years and did some catering which led to wedding cakes. Got out of that and didn't do any cakes for several years. Then my interest came back and have been doing this for a couple years now. Most of what I do now was learned or inspired here on CC!

Wow, that was long winded, but very short for my 50 year life, I guess.

Susan

My dad was this extremly talented person who could pick up anything and everything. When I was a kid, I would watch him cook and make these creations full of mousses and cremes...I have always been a "foodie" and was hooked on Julie Child and The Galloping Gourmet from early on..My step mother would fill the house with hand made candies and cookies at christmas time. My first job at 16 I worked in a duncun donuts as a finisher...I got to fill the donuts , ice them, etc. My boss loved the fact I was a foodie and I got to invent new combinations! Man, that was the best job I ever had! (paid a whopping 1.65 an hour) What got me decorating as opposed to just making cakes for well, cake, was when my daughter had her first birthday and I wanted to make an incredible cake..it was a double chocolate cake with white chocolate mousse and ganache. No buttercream to be found! hahaha! After that, everyone said I Had to bring to desert to all events (I also make pies and cookies) as as my girls got older, they wanted cakes in the shape of mickey mouse (did it free hand) and the coconut bunny I am sure EVERYONE has made from the betty crocker cookbook.
I didn't even touch a Wilton pan till about 10 years ago. When my daughter got married, she asked me to make the cake and boy, I sure made a lot of practice cakes, as I had never made a wedding cake before. After that, all her friends wanted me to make their wedding cake, so I decided This is Fun! and I took a course at the local community college in cake decorating. What a fun thing, to combine art and food!

I know everyone gets into the perfect buttercream practice and the perfect flour practice...me, still being the foodie I am, I am always playing with recipes and wanting to make it taste good!

I already had my dream of owning a business doing cakes..no thanks! I am not a business person. Although I would love to work in a bakery where I got to do the baking and the inventing and the flavor combos!

I would like to add that my favorite holiday is Thanksgiving, because I love to cook! I don't understand anyone who doesnt!

I have always loved to cook.. I grew up in the kitchen with my grandmother. I baked my first pie when I was 3.. blueberry.. and I have been baking ever since. I didn't start decorating until my daughter was born and I have been doing this as a serious business venture for a bit over a year now.

I am a foodie too and I love coming up with new and interesting combos.. if only people were more adventurous in their choices.. . So for now it's my family that gets to benefit from my experiments.

I have always been in the kitchen with my mom. There is even a home video of me at about 4 making 'shake and bake'. I was always obsessed with cookbooks - in elementary school there were two cookbooks I constantly took out of our school library. One was a disney one the other had a green cover. About a year and a half ago I started having dreams about that cookbook! I can't remember anything about it except for the sensation of reading it. One day I'll go back to school and find out what book it is - I dread it not being there.

My mom had a wealth of cookbooks at home and a few cake decorating books. One was all childrens party cakes - I would lay on the floor and pour over it for hours. My mom would always make us great cakes. She also trusted me a lot and let me use the oven when I was 8! Now I think thats crazy. She bought me one of my first cookbooks at 10 - a Chef K nonetheless.

I was living in Winnipeg for three months and found evelyn's cake decorating there. I took one private class and then was broke! I really got hooked on decorating when one of my very good friends couldnt find someone to make her a gluten free wedding cake. At first I was just going to do a small layer for the bride and groom but it quickly became the whole cake. Found baking 911 website which was a lifesaver and a few recipes. I made two practice cakes as I had never made a tiered cake before. I was up until 1 in the morning making that cake and my husband helped me space all the pearls. We drove the cake 3 hours, and just baring made it in time for the ceremony. Ceremony outside, reception right in the doors so there were people watching me set up the cake! Anyway, it was done and we went of to find a burger before the reception... I was so nervous coming back to see if it had fallen! It all turned out and I was hooked. I even ended up making my own wedding cake later that summer. I need to practice more but my husband is complaining about his waist line.

And thats my book folk... sorry

I took a class from the local community college in 1991, and have been doing a smattering of cakes for all occasions ever since

23 years!
My mom happened to over hear a decorator at a local Food Barn saying she was not coming back after maternity leave. I had the basic skills and they agreed to train me. Never thought it would be a career but here I am and loving it. I opened my business about 8 months ago.
Still a little scary but it's starting to come around.

My mom took Wilton when I was 4 or 5, and I remember "helping" her practice. I always wanted to take the classes and in 2000 I did at a Bulk Barn. Two years after that I started teaching at a Michaels, and after 6 1/2 years I am still there!

I always loved baking since as far back as I can remember, but I always wanted to learn how to do all that fancy stuff on a cake...like writing and ROSES! So, one of my mom's friends took some of the Wilton Classes at Michael's, and I asked her to make my wedding cake for me. After that I just had it in my head that I wanted to take those classes some day, and last year in Febuary, I did.

I took Wilton 1 & 2 then dropped out because they were moving way too slow for me, and I was getting more interesting information from CC anyways ! I pawned off so many of my Wilton practice cakes on at my job that they started saying 'you really should sell these' or 'that's amazing...you did that?'...so I thought that maybe I could make a business out of it since it incorporated two of my favorite things: baking and making things with my hands (ie. sculpting, drawing, painting, etc). So, as of October of last year, I've been a business owner...and I'm doing pretty well, so I'm on my way!

My first job was in bakery. The cake decorator walked out and the bakery manager said you want 7 dollars an hour to make cakes. That was alot of money for a 15 year old. Made my first wedding cake at 15. I'm 34 now, you do the math ,cause I can't bare too.Basically i've been making cakes for awhile, you could say. Love my cakes, I cannot imagine my life without my cakes and outlet!!
Andrea

I have a couple of pictures of me baking pies and cakes around 4 years old. When I was 7 I started helping my mom to make my birthday cakes. A couple of years later I wanted everything green that year so I made the cake green too. No-one would eat it until I did... it's just food coloring guys.

Well I am turning 40 and currently trying to figure out what kind of cake I will be doing for my Birthday!

I always bakes from scratch until a couple of years ago, now I mix scratch and extender recipes. I bake all kinds of stuff and I love it.

4 years ago I took some Decorating classes and loved it, then I came here and I have learned so much more since.

I love baking it's been about 36 years. The only thing that I miss is baking with my mom, she passed 3 years ago.

Keep on Caking.

Good Luck.

Ya all have such great stories!!
For me i have been seriously doing it for over a year now. I did my daughters starting from her 1st (2001) and every year after that. I guess I have always wanted to do cake; my mom did them when i was younger, and she got me started. It wasn't until when I was 10 that we discovered I was good, I entered the state fair kids contest and won 1st place. ( something my mother was never able to accomplish! hehe) So, place me in the always category...never had had any formal training either.

Here's the hippy and not so fantastic version. I baked with my grandmother once a year growing up. She had me come in and make cookies with her at Christmas time, otherwise, no kids in the kitchen! My mom was and still is anti cooking/baking, really anything other than microwaving.

So I spent a lot of time smoking the green and having the munchies and I started making cookies. Then my friend circle grew. and grew. and grew. and I realized it wasn't the green they wanted as much as the cookies that followed. Now, you know some high people will eat anything, so I wasn't patting myself on the back too much.


My husband and I found out we were having our first child and the green went away, but thanks to pregnancy munchies the cookies continued. He worked at a country club and I woulds end cookies and tarts and other new pregnancy creations with him. They LOVED IT ALL and started buying cookies and napoleons and pies from me for different occassions. This grew and split and multiplied until I was making cheesecakes and other stuff.

Then one day a friend said to me, you should consider really decorating and making wedding cakes or something. I was like, yeah, no thank you, I love these delicate tasty treats I have. She proceeded to tell me about the wilton classes she took. My mom kept pushing me to take the wilton classes and said she thought I would love it. no.

But I started buying some stuff and trying my hand at decorating anyway. I began phasing in decorated cakes and in the process phasing out other desserts. It's been about 6 years (since I started selling desserts) and I don't offer anything other than decorated cakes.

18 years! IN 1990, took the 3 Wilton classes with my then boyfriend's mom. I began making about 3 cakes per week for co-workers and didn't know how to say no. I was so busy making cakes for everyone else, that I didn't have time to practice new techniques and after 1 1/2 yrs was beginning to burn out.

Dumped the boyfriend and started dating my now husband and didn't want to spend every night in the kitchen. Over the next 10 - 12 years, baked cakes occasionally but worked alot and didn't have time.

My passion was rekindled about 1 1/2 - 2 years ago and I'm more serious now than I was originally. I'm loving learning new techniques and you can teach an old dog new tricks! I will finish Wilton's fondant and gumpaste class on Monday and also took a 1 day class with Bronwen Weber in May.

I still hate cleanup but love decorating, especially gumpaste and fondant