Hi all,

I am making a 4 tier cake for a friend on Sunday. It has to be at the venue by 1PM. It is a gift, but I want it all to look perfect. 

My tiers are 14, 12, 10 and 8; starting with the bottom, they are chocolate with raspberry, marble with ganache, WASC with lemon curd and WASC with SMBC. When making the bottom layers, my recipe only gave me one 14 inch pan, and it was only a bit over an inch tall. I made three more, two cracked, I took the advice given here,  since it is a gift, and I "glued" the one back together with BC. I did the bottom tier today - it's 3 layers, filled with the raspberry and with a crumb coat on it.

A few questions, please? Since this bottom ended up taller than 4", and the SPS system I bought on the recommendation of many of you is only 4", I planned on doweling the bottom layer and then using the sps on top of that and on the other layers, as well. Can I do this? 

I would recommend  trying to get the base tier down to 4-4.15" so that you can have that solid, even base that the SPS provides. a small shift or discrepancy in the levelness at the base layer will throw the whole cake off. 

And what is a last minute plan with a cake of this size? All my layers are baked and frozen. As I said, the bottom was filled, crumb coated and back in the freezer. When should I assemble the other tiers? I am doing the final assembly at the  place - it is a birch tree cake on a slab stand, all buttercream, with some chocolate pine cones (thanks, costumeczar, although mine don't look as good as  your's do!!) and butterflies and acorns. But can I do the ganache ahead of time, and then refreeze? Or should I just take everything out Friday or Saturday, fill, crumb coat, chill and final BC. And what can I do three days out? Two days? The day before?

Personally, I would aim to have the cakes finished to go on Sat night. On friday you can make your fillings, and then Saturday morning fill and crumb coat with a weigh down to settle the tiers, then do the final buttercream in the evening. Friday could be devoted to making your buttercream and fillings, organizing your supports, prepping your cake boards and the shipping boxes.  

As you can tell, I have having trouble organzing all of the tasks. I have to have the final layer of BC on when I leave the house. I planned on piping around each tier after I put them together at the venue. Anything I should bring, besides piping bag, extra cake, extra buttercream, more supports??? Thank you!! 

Nancy