Opening up another session of the FNCC! Everyone is welcome to share their week, photos of their work, ask for help or provide help if they can. Hope to see lots of great cakes tonight!

Cat

Hi everyone!  Last week of packing for me. One last room to pack and one storage unit to straighten up and we'll be all ready to go!!! Just a reminder that there will be no FNCC next Friday the 17th! I won't have computer access till the following Monday so we'll catch up the following Friday!

Cat

I'm doing my first sculpted cake tonight. I'm a bit nervous, but I've taken in a ton of good advice from this community. :) It's a skate park lookalike cake for the first skateboard competition of a neighboring town's new park. The last of my pound cake is in the oven now. I also made some little gumpaste skateboards to top some supplemental cupcakes.

@LaurenK314  If you have the time then let the cake cool then freeze it (double wrapped in cling wrap or Press & Seal) overnight. Then, tomorrow fill it, carve it, crumb coat it and then decorate it. It's much easier to carve a cake when it's partially frozen.  Please do share photos when you are done! I just love to see what people come up with! 

Cat

I finished a new cake this weekend, ready for a friends daughter's 5th birthday. She's mad on Frozen so I took the chance to do a couple of new things with it.

http://www.cakecentral.com/gallery/i/3345550/frozen-cake

First off, I did my first go at sugar glass. Took three attempts but got it right in the end. I was heating it up too fast the first two times and the colour kept going too brown. I was waiting until my thermometer said it was 300 degrees, but by then it was already brown and caramelising so I went with my instincts on the last attempt and took it off the heat earlier, came out perfectly! Also looks good on the cake as ice and offsets the colours of the cake nicely :)

Also my first time using figures on the cake as well. Always resisted this, prefer to make the characters out of fondant but these are far too detailed for me to be able to do successfully so went a different direction with it. Got the characters from Amazon, made sure they are food safe and used edible glue to stick them on. Best thing is, the little girl gets a set of Frozen figures from the cake to keep :)

I'm pretty pleased with this one, just hope it travels OK :D

@CoinUK  I love the ice shards!! What a cool background for the figures! I always used the plastic figures so I adhere to copyright law when I was doing this as a business. I wanted to share my kids cakes with the world too and didn't want a client coming back and saying "I want it like that!" with fondant characters. This past April I finally made a character out of fondant (Lego Batman) for my grandson's cake because I am no longer doing this as a business and it was a BLAST! So I can definitely understand the appeal of making them yourself.  And, yes, it was always fun to be able to give the birthday kid the figures when the cake was eaten! (My son and grandson ate poor Batman! LOL!) Did you use the snowflake punch? I have a set and LOVE it! I'd tried cookie cutters before and it sucked...the snowflakes kept warping on me when I went to put them on the cake. But with the punch you just wet the back of the snowflake, while still in the punch, and apply it straight to the cake! Magic! LOL! And they look so perfect too!  Any FROZEN fan would be thrilled with this cake!

Cat

No, I didn't do it like that, but now I wish I had :D

That is a very clever idea. I did it the old fashioned way of just stamping them out with the punch and then letting them firm up before I stuck them on. It worked well enough, although I had to be careful doing it so as to not move the snowflake arms too much. I'll try your method next time I think :)

@CoinUK  UK Your sugar shards look great! That's not something I've delved into yet. It adds so much to the top of the cake. I used a plastic figure for my Tinkerbell cake in my gallery, and I could only find her in a set of six, so the birthday girl had a nice little playset of figures, which worked out.

@catlharper  Thanks for the advice! My delivery was at 10 this morning so I didn't have time to finish the cake day-of, but for a bigger sculpture I'll be sure to try the freezing method. I would imagine this helps with crumbs as well as firmness for shaping, yes?

Here's (http://www.cakecentral.com/gallery/i/3345595/skate-park-lookalike-cake) what I came up with. I'm still buttercream-only at this point; I know it would probably have looked better with fondant, but this was a charity cake, so I was happy to help out.

@LaurenK314 yes, it certainly does help with the crumbs. And that turned out cool! My 14 year old loved it too!

Cat

This was a last minute (like two days) request for Shelby who likes art.

This was for a girl who likes whales and Persian cats

I swear you don't know from one day to the next what people are going to ask for!

You seem to have customer that have interesting request :) First time I've ever seen a cat hanging out on a whale lol.

I didn't get to bake at all this week, unfortunately a minor incident turned into a huge ordeal. I will definitely share the story if you all want it just has some major drama in it and i didn't want over run the post haha  (I will say it involves a car door ding, cops, and restraining orders). Finally yesterday I was able to bake what I've been eager to bake all week. Reese's cupcakes and I have to admit they were worth the wait. I found the recipe on cc and made some changes based on my chocolate cake recipe but otherwise stuck to the recipe :)

I really love the whale with the cat on top cake!! That one is so cute!!! The reese's buttercream cupcakes look great and delicious!!

@Webake2gether   you HAVE to tell us the story!

@Pastrybaglady  You get the cutest cake requests. I get "themes". LOL! I adore your whale!

@Webake2gether  Oh my those look yummy! And as for your week...dish away! Sounds like it was drama drama drama!

Cat

Hi everyone!

Its been a great week for me. I got to do a wedding cake for my cousin! They also wanted cake pops. Here are the pictures:

Wedding cake:

http://www.cakecentral.com/gallery/i/3345678/vintage-wedding-cake

Cake pops:

http://www.cakecentral.com/gallery/i/3345540/glitter-cake-pops

I will also be entering the cake in a decorating contest. Hoping to win :)

My goodness @SweetShop5  is that center tier real cake?! What did you cover it with? Simply gorgeous!

Cat

Haha no its not. Its a fake tier and we covered it with non edible glitter. I wish it was real lol! Thank you :)

All I could think @SweetShop5  is how gorgeous it was but how it wouldn't have a great "mouth-feel" because of the glitter...but, at the same time wondering where you found such gorgeous glitter! LOL! It really does take the cake to a new level!

Cat

Thanks they are very delicious!! I've had 2 yesterday lol. 

Ok so I will share the story but please brace yourselves for a novel :)

a little back ground my car was parked on the side of the street in front of my house the beginning of June and a man hit my car and did quite a bit of damage popped my tire completely and bent my rim so I didn't have my car for 16 days. Fast forward to this last Monday. I'm out grocery shopping and got a phone call as I was pulling into Kroger so while I was on the phone sitting in my parked car some guy opens his door and hits my newly fixed car and dings it pretty good. He begged me to just let it go but I told him I just couldn't so as I'm getting his info This sketchy looking woman comes out asking him for money. And starts getting on him about hitting my car she goes back into the store and he asked me to follow him to his insurance agents office I agreed bc I wanted to get this taken care of. When I got to the agents office the woman's whole demeanor changed she was standing in a very tight and aggressive manner. She started right in on how I should let it go and that they are just paying for a buff out and then my son opened the back door (he's 5) she looked at me and said "don't you have locks on your door?" Very hateful and confrontational and I looked at her and said "that is irrelevant right now and I will only be speaking to you from this point on (to the agent)" the agent looked at her and said we aren't here for that and that's irrelevant. 

I left the agents office went to their preferred auto body shop and then mine to get a few estimates the damage totaled $351. I turned them into his agent and came home. Several hours later my phone rings and it's the guy who dinged my door this woman is screaming obscenities and I can't even hear him talking she then says " you know what I'm going to "f" you up "f" your little kids up and really do some "stuff" to your car now "b" so I calmly said "this conversation is over you are not going to threaten my kids I'm calling the police this conversation is over do not call me again" 

i hung up and called the police while I was on the phone that woman called me from her phone and I didnt answer. The police show up about 10:30 to take my report and I went ahead pressed charges. The cop goes over to arrest her and when she gets there other officers are already there and the woman was taken to our local physc ward involuntarily bc she was out of control threatening to kill people and the man who hit my car. Apparently she is bipolar  and was off of her medication that day and lost it. So the man who is 71 took out a restraining order against her (by the way she is 47) and she has been charged with disorderly conduct, breech of peace and harassment I believe. So if she doesn't plead out I'll be subpoenaed to court to testify. The man admitted to the cop that she threatened me and his story was exactly like mine. This may sound strange considering the threats she made to my kids but my heart hurts for her. I can't wrap my mind around such a serious mental condition. I hope that this situation is a learning point for her and she is able to get long term help. I stand by my decision to press charges bc regardless of her condition we all have to be held accountable for our choices.  Needless to say that set the tone for my week and I'm glad it's over at this point. By the charges I pressed there is basically a no contact order in place so if we are the same store I can have the manager escort off the property and she can't come on my property. Even more messed up is his insurance agent gave them my information I never did the cop said while there isn't much we can do about that it was unacceptable and this could have been avoided if he hadn't. Crazy huh??? 

It really makes the cake sparkle, thats why I love it. There's probably a way to make it edible, but it would cost SO much to do since you need so much glitter lol!

@Webake2gether   WOW! Ok, so if I have this right...your car gets dinged in the parking lot by the 70 year old guy. Then this 47 year old woman (maybe his daughter?) comes out of the store and yells at him, yells at you? Then you go see the agent who takes the info and tries to deal with the woman too...but the agent gives them your information? Then, later, she calls you, threatens you and your family and then you have to press charges, get her arrested and may end up going to court? Wow! But I agree with you. If she is bipolar then she needs her meds...hopefully this will teach her not to go off of them again. I do think that if I were you I would be considering if the agent giving out your information was legal or not. That agent may need some re-education as well on proper and legal conduct. 

Hope this is sorted for good for you!

Cat

@catlharper  Not his daughter it was his girlfriend and their "relationship" qualifies as questionable if you get what I'm saying. You got it basically none of her business and she ends up in jail. My husband was pretty clear with the agent that it was not ok and that we plan on filing a complaint with corporate. This whole fiasco is lose lose for all involved at this point but hopefully something good comes from it :)  

Oh my.  I was wondering how the crazy woman got your number.  What a bizarre turn of events!  You need some baking therapy stat :D

Now I'm dealing with a generic insurance company who is really going above and beyond to not accept the claim. Fortunately I just dealt with another difficult insurance company so I learned persistence is necessary lol. 

I had a very peaceful session of baking therapy on Saturday while my husband and boys napped (rare) and then I spent 2 days self medicating with those cupcakes  lol. Boy they were good :) 

we are having some scorcher temps here so today's therapy is sprinkler fun with 2 little boys no oven today :) 

Okay!  Jackie says we can now attach photos from any device.  I'm on my phone, let's see how it works...

 

Woohoo!  

Whooo Hooo @Pastrybaglady  Glad you figured it out! Maybe they are figuring out how to sort this issue out for us!

I'm deep in the moving mode. Movers are here now and this is feeling like the longest day ever. SIGH. Tomorrow is part two...the unloading!

Cat

Good luck Cat, almost Home!

They actually reinstalled the old picture button so you can load a picture from your device or a picture from a website.  It's the sun and mountain icon above!

Thank you @Pastrybaglady  This week has been SO stressful. Can't wait till I'm relaxing at the beach Monday afternoon!