Thank you Indydebi! It's a mind-blowing yet delightfully mind-opening concept for me. I usually only have time to bake when my kiddos are in bed, so anything to help effienciency is a heaven-sent!

traci, just be sure to put the smaller pans at the front of the oven as these will probably come out a few minutes before the larger pans. (a simple idea, but I wont' admit how I figured that one out! )

indydebi, I am assuming you use both racks when you do this. Do you change the cakes from one rack to the other about half way through? Or do the cakes bake the same with some on the upper and some on the lower. I have only baked 2 at a time because I didn't think it would work using both racks. This would be a great time saver if I can make it work.

I can fit two 6" pans and two 8" pans on one rack.

Thanks, indydebi, that helps.

I think it's all how you look at time. I did a 2 tier fondant cake with gumpaste flowers on it last week and I said it took me 5 hours total. But not from the first egg crack to the last flower being applied. It was carrot cake, so I had to grate carrots, make the batter, put it into the 4 pans and they all baked at once, during that time I cleaned the kitchen and made the buttercream to fill it. Covered the buttercream, pulled the cakes out and let them cool. 1 hour.

Then I stopped working on cakes and moved to a different area of life. The next day, I torted and filled, took me like 20 minutes, I wrapped them up and put a weight on top, walked away. Total I spent about 30 minutes. I know this because it was right before I picked my kids up from school, had the counters wiped up and everything.

That night I spent an hour and a half making gumpaste flowers. Left them to dry

The next day I trimmed the cakes and crumb coated, tossed them in the freezer and started rolling my fondant, pulled them out and had them both covered and stacked. Took 1 hour. Then I spent another hour that evening rolling vines and attaching them, making chocolate leaves and attaching the flowers. 5 hours total, over 3 days. There is no way that from start to finish I could do this cake in 5 hours, the stages have to dry and cool and all of that, but I don't considering myself "working on the cake" in that time either...

Since I've received another PM about how to remove the rose/where I put the rose on my "How to make BC roses on a stick" video, here's the link to the thread with all the info (hope you like reading)!

http://cakecentral.com/cake-de.....ml#6487080

The link should pull up page 2 (feel free to read page 1 as well, but expect to see a lot of double posts because CC had lots of problems during that week.) Also, page 1 won't show my photos because they deleted them, so I had to reload them elsewhere and repost it all again.

I hope you enjoy it!

Bluehue, I am in awe of your wonderful housework schedule!!! Vacuuming every day is something I could only dream of in my craziest drunken stupor . The bathrooms and the kitchen are regularly cleaned with vehemence, and the kids' room is always tidied and elements of it are constantly being washed, but that's about all I can say for regimented cleaning in my house . The vacuuming, dusting, and baseboards are left to their own devices except for every other week or so .

And to answer the original question, When people ask how long it takes I tell them it varies depending on the cake design, but that this is my full-time job.

BlueHue, I'll tradeja....I'll take on one of your cakes (and I'll even try to do it perfect!) if you come clean my house!

haha....

Indy I gotta get me one of those merry maids you were talking about....

It takes me a couple of hours to do a cake from start to finish. I am not rushing to crank 'em out, but I do practice all the time to get better.

(For Decorator Unlimited) ~ I love your roses! Though I've seen it done, I have never tried making them on a dowel tip. Gonna practice it.

I was always so discouraged at how long it took me to do a cake, and then all of a sudden you learn and it get so much easier, especially when you have great instructors here at CC! Anyone who is new to this, be patient!

When my kids were little I used to tell my x "cleaning around here is like emptying the titanic with a dixie cup".

I don't have a ton of cakes under my belt, but for instance, yesterday, I baked two 8" and 6" layers, made 2 batches of SMBC, baked torted, filled, crumbcoated, then covered the tiers in fondant. I also made appliques, a gumpaste shoe, then stacked the cakes and added finishing touches (pearl border, tappit letters etc). Oh, and I baked 48 mini cupcakes.

I started at 9a.m. and finished at midnight. Dh thinks I'm slow and took the kids out from 9-5 yesterday because he wanted me to 'finish everything during the day'. Needless to say, I was then stressed about not meeting 'his' deadline that he considered enough time to get it all done ("come on, I'm giving you the *whole* day without the kids"). When they got home, I had just covered the tiers in fondant. I finished everything by midnight except frosting the cupcakes (I'm doing those this morning). He thinks that I take too long to possibly make any money - I'm not in business but am/was entertaining the idea. I'm not sure if I should be discouraged at my speed or not.

tsal, you probably "wasted" time stopping for lunch and taking some pee breaks! Shame on you!

But I'm not taking any of this from the aspect of it being about how a business operates. I'm just talking in general about doing stuff and doing it faster and better so you can do the next thing. This is purely philosophical. We in general I think are too caught up in doing more and more and more. Produce produce produce. It's good but it's not everything.

Cramming our schedules with events and obligations and things to do and places to go, people to see and things to make, for me, I'm certainly over it.

It's perfectly ok to not to do anything to not make anything and to be still and quiet and to craft a cake slowly.

I have friends who feel guilty if they are not 'doing something' and one of my friends had a heart arrest once in her early 20's from GottaDoItItis. I used to be more that way, do do do make make make--but early on she kinda made me stop & think. Now the GottaDoItItis's of the world are probably providing balance for the GottaKeepTheCouchWarmers like me but I'll think about that tomorrow. I need to go keep the couch warm right now.

I am guess 3 hours was probably just the decorating time (not including baking) but maybe not. It really just depends on the cake. It usually takes me 30 minutes just to make icing, but sometimes I already have it on hand. It usually takes me a lot longer to make a cake than I plan on. I just made a 2 tier cake that I think took me 12 hours.

I do like a clean house (not to say that mine IS clean though)! But my SIL just said this to me the other day "People who have clean houses are boring" LOL

I also like a clean house, but there are more important things at times so it will be there when you get around to it. Life is too short.

I said this in another thread:
A thousand years from now, when we're all dead and gone, we aren't going to be judged by how clean our house was or wasn't.

(My neighbor with ten children used to say this! I think it's true!)

(CWR41) ~ I know what you mean.

Thanks!

(K8memphis) ~ Hilarious! (keeping the couch warm!) I'm glad you've found your balance! I have days where I don't even feel like getting dressed, but it's hard to sit still when I've been ruined by assembly-line ethics. I'm not complainingI love what I've learned, but having nightmares about folding boxes or building cartons can be stressful!

My husband used to tease me because I could never walk down the hallway with only one thing in my handI had to try to take it all at once without making a second trip. When I failed, dropped it all, and had to pick everything up, he'd just laugh. Oh well, at least I'd try. That's why I say I'm ruined, because I'm always looking for ways to trim some timehopefully, successfully!