I'm trying quite unsuccessfully to make buttercream roses. They look great on the stick but once I take them off with scissors, I can't for the life of me get them off the scissors without tearing them up. I tried adding more powdered sugar (eventually so much that I couldn't even pipe with it) and it didn't help. I'm using royal icing but am about to make a crusting buttercream for my cake so I guess I could use that, if it'd make a difference. I'm about to give up and just pipe rosettes, but I really want roses! Help?

you open the scissors a bit when you lift it up off the nail then just scoot the rose off the tip of the scissors with the other end of the rose nail while closing the scissors

also i pipe a little blob on the cake where the rose will sit so i have a little place to set it

Pipe them on little squares of wax paper.  Put a dab of icing on the nail, put the wax paper on the nail, pipe the rose. Pull off the paper with the rose on it and put it in the freezer for a few minutes to firm up.  Then place on your cake.

As K8 said, having a blob of icing on the cake really helps. Once I pull the rose off the nail, I have the scissors open so there is about a 1/2" gap between the tips of the scissors (it'll be covered by the rose, just trying to give you an idea of how far I have them open) To place it on the cake, push into the blob so that the scissors are sunk down into it. Then, make tiny, tiny scissoring movements as you pull the scissors away. The rose should shimmy off the scissors and stay on the blob of icing. Remember, frosting leaves cover a multitude of rose sins. If the bottom area of the rose gets goopy or a petal is pulled away, cover it with a little piped leaf. And I don't know if it will help, but I just use regular scissors (cleaned and sterilized) instead of the little plastic "rose lifter" scissors. I feel like the larger scissors make it easier. But that might just be me.

I made a video (no scissors!)  Hope it helps. Click on the link in my signature line below.

Sorry.  I don't know where the signature lines disappeared to with all the new changes.  Maybe someone can direct me on how to find them!

My husband also makes a blob of icing like the other bakers said and he uses regular kitchen scissors when he makes roses and if I recall correctly he gets the rose as close to the end of the scissors as possible.  He can make beautiful roses but the other day we did a practice cake and he wanted to make roses to decorate it but the buttercream didn't cooperate so we added more powdered sugar and that made it too stiff then we tried to thin it out a bit and that didn't help either so he just piped on some flowers with a different tip. Some times things just don't cooperate keep trying though different techniques work or different people :)

And air dry them.  Things put in a freezer will start to melt when removed from the freezer.  Air drying removes the moisture leaving you a nice well crusted rose that is still nice and soft inside when the client eats them.

Indydebi~~How long can they be air dryed at room temperature?

I used to make dozens of them and keep them on trays for days.  they were usually used up by the end of the week.  Once they are dry, if you want to keep them longer, then you could box them up and freeze them (no moisture in them to "melt" when removed from freezer).  I just put them on a tray and sit it on the back of the counter (in the shop I kept them on the tray-rack).  Once dry, cover them loosely with saran to keep dust off of them.

(Annakat444, apologies in advance if I'm highjacking the thread...) 

Indydebi~~

Thanks for the info!  After 5 years of this hobby, I've discovered that buttercream, not fondant, is my favorite medium.  I am capable of making most buttercream flowers, but hate all the work involved in having a lot of different colors.  My "dream cake" is one similar to cakes done by ArtyCakes in the UK. 

A google search for images using the words:  arty cakes, buttercream   will show the dense, floral designs with a ton of colors that I'd like to re-create. Here is a you-tube video with another example:

This is how I "think" I can reduce the preparation for a cake that is similar to Arty Cakes designs.   Please tell me if I'm on the right track.  I am a hobby baker and don't make a lot of cakes and would appreciate ANY suggestions for achieving this type of floral design that will decrease the work load for making one to three cakes at a time.    (Assumption:  If I were making 5-10+ cakes a week, the efficiency would be greater because of the volume.)

I have an upright, manual defrost, "cake" freezer where I can store extra cakes, cupcakes, buttercream, etc.   (one of my most favorite cake "tools"!)  including previously made, 2-5 day, air-dryed, buttercream flowers.

1.  Start with a large bowl of white buttercream and mix each new batch of colored BC starting with the lightest color, put into plastic wrap frosting bullets, then use the same bowl to make the progressively darker colors and place each new, darker color in frosting bullets.   Example:  White to ivory, yellow to gold, peach to orange, pink to red, lavender to purple, blue to navy, mint to green, tan to brown, gray to black.

2.  Don't completely mix each color batch, just close enough to get desired dominant color with some natural-looking color variations like those found on real flowers.

3.  Let the darker colors like navy, royal blue, purple, black, deepen in the frosting bullets rather than continuing to add gel colors to obtain a darker tone.

4.  ? Stripe each or half of frosting bullets with separate color ?

5.  Prepare a cookie sheet full of a specific type of flower using a specific tip (ex:  mums using tip 81, shaggy mum tip 233, daisy tip 104...).  Using one bag with a specific tip, put in different colored frosting bullets to create different colors of same flowers.  Place flowers on cookie sheet to air-dry 2-5 days, then use or freeze in clean pizza boxes on parchment paper.

6.  Crumb coat/final ice cake.  Before placing each flower, pipe a blob of frosting for flower to adhere to cake, pipe smaller, easy flowers.  Pipe leaves/vines last.  Cover any mistakes with more flowers/leaves/vines.

(whew....I'm already exhausted and I'm only thinking about this.....)

Thanks!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xs0pasigWw&feature=youtu.be

Big, giant, thanks to both MBalaska for the fabulous link and to Indydebi (for PM conversation). 

After seeing the video, it feels SO much "easier" and "do-able".  I think the effort involved got bigger and bigger in my head like a wad of chewing gum gets bigger and bigger in your mouth.

Ahhhh....all better now.

that's such a fun youtube link!!

Still don't know how to find the signature lines, but here's the direct link:

http://s984.photobucket.com/user/Unlimited1cakes/media/20090718_013631.mp4.html?o=2

Sorry that I was too lazy to look it up sooner!