I have used piping gel before on cakes to get the water looking effect, but never tried to write on it.

I just made a cake that is a pond. the whole thing is covered in piping gel.

what can i use to write happy birthday on it?

I want something that will stick, but not bleed alot. and the piping gel is not smooth, its kinda humpy, cause its water...

did that make sense at all?

I have Royal, but thought that would dry WAY too hard.

I have buttercream, its thick constistancy right now. mixed it up to pipe grass.

SHould I use it and thin it out some?

I wish now I had cut out fondant letters, but the cake is small and already its got little room for lettering..

more gel... tinted a darker color ?

(will almost look like it's written in the motion of the water if you go with the flow of the 'bumps' in your already piped gel)

OH that would be PERFECT!! If I had any gel left... I dont know why I only bought one tub of it. I KNEW I had to have some next week for a cake. and standing there I told myself "two for this cake, one for Matts cake" and then put ONE in my buggy. I did have enough to do this with, but just barely...

Sometimes I swear I need a keeper...

There should be a recipe for homemade piping gel on this site.

You can write Happy Birthday with some melted chocolate.

Do it on some wax paper, chill until hardened, then peel and place onto cake.

Thanks for the suggestions! I did try to make the piping gel I saw on here- had exactly (and I do mean EXACTLY ) one cup of karo. that stuff is ALL jacked up. LOL

I ended up finding out that buttercream does NOT bleed onto piping gel, it sits there nicely.
and if I could write, it would have worked great.

Unfortunatly, I had two things going against me, ONE, I added water to thin my buttercream, got pinkish white lines and dots in it.

two, I cant write to stave my life some days. and I actually have pretty handwriting.

I had to redo it about 8 times. finally I ran out of the blue tinted piping gel I had left and couldnt fix what I scraped off and had to leave it LOL

I even bought the stencil things to help me write. but couldnt use them on piping gel. LOL