Well here it is ... in all it's glory : ) My daughterâs very best friends birthday cake. This cake was doomed from the start, when I first stacked it the night before, it started to lean. I took it all apart, carved a hole into the bottom tier so the second tier could sit flat⦠that helped, I should have done the same with the second tier but I was afraid I would lose too much height. I really thought it would hold at that point especially because I had used two center dowels and many dowels in each tier. Each tier is 4 layers high. I carved the top at an angle and restacked the carved section so on one side I suppose you could say itâs 5 layers. It was huge. Anyway, on the way to the party, I had to drive up Mount Everest. On any other day, itâs just a driveway, a little bumpy, has a slight curve and goes up a hill but nothing severe⦠but with the cake in the back of my van rockin and rolling, I felt like I was climbing the tallest mountain, I was going slow trying to keep the cake steady, my tires actually started to slip up the hill. Then it fell when I hit a pothole. It went down in one piece and came back up the same way since I had the center dowels and none of my supports shifted luckily so it stood back up pretty good. I did the best I could to fix it, and thankfully it fell towards the back. It will be awhile til I will be able to bring myself to do another topsy turvy. I felt so bad bringing this monstrosity to the party! Any thoughts on how to attach the cake to my base? I was thinking I should have hammered my center dowel all the way down to the silver board, I just nailed it down to the bottom of the cake so the cake itself separated from the board. I donât know if that would have helped. Maybe I should have just finished stacking it at the party? Any thoughts anyone can share would be much appreciated!

your cake looks great. good job.

I think your cake looks beautiful and I hope mine looks as good when ever I get up the courage to do one.

What a sweet cake! I bet they all loved it.

What kind of cake board did you have under the cake? If you are attaching it to the cake with icing and then placing it on a cake drum you can "roll" duct tape (it comes in white) and stick them to each other. It should hold really well.

I'm sorry to hear all the trouble it gave you, but I think it's gorgeous! I'm sure the b-day girl was in love with her cake!!

I use the thickest foamboard from Michael's/Hobby Lobby. I think it is almost a 1/2". Then sharpen the dowels and make sure they go all the way thru the foamboard.

Well on the bottom I used the silver 12 inch board from wilton and then I had just a regular carboard round and then the cake on top of that. Everything was simply glued down with icing. I was thinking that I should have hammered the dowel all the way down to the very bottom. I wasn't sure if that would help but since Mac suggested it, I think I'll try both suggestions and duct tape the cardboard round to the base and then hammer the dowel all the way through. Thank you for all the kind words, that makes me feel so much better. I really felt like I ruined the poor girls birthday but according to her mom who is a very good friend of mine, she said the birthday girl never even noticed. I fear she was being nice though. Thanks alot!

I think we are much harder on ourselves and others really don't see all the "mistakes" that we do.

I had the top of a cake pop off the sps plate it was on. Thank goodness I caught it and it went back on perfectly. It was the top tier. I'm pretty sure it was that my icing wasn't totally dry or maybe not enough.

foam core and duct tape should work!

I wish my cake disasters looked that good! Pretty cake, you can't even tell anything happened.

I think the cake looks quite good, I'm not just saying that. We ourselves always notice every little thing that isn't perfect.

I think your cake is absolutely lovely! I love the design and colours you choose and I think it's a great topsy turvy cake! From all of the other posts that I have been reading they either suggest using the dowel through all the cakes for support during traveling or to set up all the tiers at the location. Whichever is easiest for you! Loved the cake and I'm sure your DD's BF did too!