I baked my cakes for a good friend's first birthday and covered with a thin layer of fondant this week. I made hexagonal fondant cut-outs to cover one with a soccer ball pattern, which lined up perfectly on the table ... but don't translate AT ALL once they're on the the stinking cake! I don't know what went wrong, the sides were truly all lining up, but my angles are all wrong now! I've peeled off all the cut outs, and my edges are all raggedy ..... ARGH!!!! I just finished a 28- hour shift at work and came home to do this, and I'm so stinking tired, I just need to finish this cake! Probably the wrong attitude ... but I'm not having fun . This was too straightforward a cake to have a hard time with it .

Soccer balls have two different geometric shapes--the usually black parts are pentagons the other white shapes are ahh something else..brb...

http://www.soccersquared.com/soccer/52/

So it's pentagons and hexagons--you got half of 'em!

I made my first Soccerball cake a little while ago - and after much it finally dawned on me.....the actual ball shape changes circumfrence - - Anyway, as i got nearer to the bottom, the pentagons faced down - not up... if that makes sense.

There is a pic in my photo section.

POOR THING, YOU MUST BE SOOOO TIRED -
Hope you get some rest soon.

Bluehue.

Google "soccer ball template". Print it out to the size you want. It will look like a bunch or random pents and hexes spreading out from the center pentagon. Cut one section out, meaning one pent and one hex that are connected. Cut these apart. Start with that one pent, make your templates, and build your soccer ball out like a flower opening. It takes some smooshing here and there, especially once you have the middle done, and you have to be careful. I am finishing up a GP soccer ball topped cake with little soccer balls around the edges as we speak. It works, you just have to be a little patient.

Thanks so much, guys! Yes, Bluehue, it is the shape of the cake that messes it up, you are absolutely right! Lurvely, that's a great idea for the templates - I will definitely use it next time. K8memphis, I had originally seen the pentagon/hexagon mix and eas going to tr that, but I made my hexagons with a cookie cutter, and in my mental haze just lined them all up on the table and they seemed to fit, and I stupidly didn't think about it again. Anyhow! So it ended up being pretty torn up and not my proudest cake moment, but my friend loved it and her one-year old could care less. I did my best to patch up the ugly holes in the design with the "bunting" swags I made for the cake, to at least not make it glaringly obvious how discordant the shapes were towards the bottom of the cake.

Anyhow! I've posted it, if you want to see how it turned out. I've pretty much given up on posting a picture in my thread, though my DH is here and might be able to help me ... let me see if it works ... Thanks again for the encouragement earlier!

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-Emi.[/img]