I tried to post this before but it seems to have gotten lost in space!  How did most of you get started learning decorating techniques?  I am taking the Wilton classes now but have learned so much on this site.  I will finish the course 2 next week and plan on taking the gum paste and fondant classes too but was just wondering how others learned how to do all the different techniques.  The thing I like about taking the classes is that I can actually see how things are done.    (I have all ready learned not to use Wilton recipe for butter cream from y'all!)

Ai learned by reading books and practicing this all pre-internet -- then in the last 12 years i've gotten to attend some demos and classes

AI watched every YouTube and read every post I could read! I have only been doing this for about 21/2 years. A huge help was joining mycakeschool.com. Best $30 I ever spent. Good recipes and basic knowledge. I am a visual learner and have purchased tons of the Craftsy classes as well. They are awesome.

AI started by reading on various blogs, I wanted to make a cake for my daughters Halloween Party. I just jumped in, Ive always been very creative so once I started working with fondant & modeling chocolate things just clicked. The decorating came easily to me but baking was another story. Basically, I would research different techniques then practice.

I started researching recipes, and experimenting with ingredients (I started baking the WASC & variations but I really wanted to learn scratch baking as well as the science behind it...which I'm still learning) using my friends/family as guinea pigs.

I never took any of the Witon classes so I can't speak to those. After I had the basics down I took a couple Craftsy classes as well as another online platform Learn Cake Decorating Online (Verusca Walker, Jessica P, Handi, etc some of my cake crushes that contribute). But mainly just trial & error. I would love to take some live classes with The Caketress, Mike M, etc.

I don't have a professional background in pastry but I have taken a couple business classes. Ive also learned a lot from CC, I still do.

Do what works for you, the best advice I can offer is to practice. Dont jump into business because your friends/family think its a good idea.

I also got my start with the Wilton classes. They helped a lot with basic techniques, but I did spend a TON of time doing research online while I was taking those classes. This website helped immensely in that regard as well as various cake blogs for ideas and youtube videos for techniques.

More than half a lifetime ago, I read about it in a late-1960s or early-1970s Betty Crocker Cookbook. Then I did a few. Then, around 1989, when I was working for another software company, and had every reason to think I'd succeeded in making the product that had been dumped in my lap was finally safe for the end-users (it wasn't, and never would be, but I walked out without ever convincing management it would never be), I baked one of those little microwave cakes to celebrate, and bought tips, couplers, and disposable piping bags to decorate them.

Then, a little over four years ago, when it was obvious I'd have to take over baked goods in my family, but didn't have the time or the experience to bake my own birthday cake, I added my age, in colored frosting out of a tube, to a cake from the grocer. Then I bought a bag of couplers, and started buying tips as needed, and found a local cake supply shop that would do edible printing for me.

A

Same here. Wilton classes got the ball rolling, but practice and online research is what really helped me improve my skills.

Thanks everyone, guess I am starting out the right way, practice, practice and then some more practice!  I am just doing this for fun and to make cakes for family and friends, I've been the neighborhood baker for a long time but would do scratch cakes and then (oh for shame ) put canned frosting on them.  Now I know better. 

AWell, better canned frosting than trying to make a frosting in a flavor you neither like nor eat, and therefore have no way to judge. That's why when I bake a chocolate cake (which I will probably never do again, given that I only made them for my mother) I always use canned frosting.

Have always been a good baker, but was never into decorating with anything but canned icing and sprinkles. I have taken the Wilton classes over this past year. Have watched a lot of you tube videos on cake decorating.Bought a lot of books on the subject. Read the postings on this website, which have been extremely helpful.Practiced all the techniques and made cakes to take to the office. Also ordered some Craftsy classes.

I started with the Wilton class and took the first 3.  Then it just became a lot of practice, reading books, studying techniques, and taking online classes.  There aren't many options around my area for actual hands on classes.  I hope to be able to take vacation days and attend some classes on the East and West coasts to get more practical experience.  It is true, you do learn a lot on this site by listening to what people say and asking for advice. Keep at it if it is something you are passionate about.  

I took lessons from a former Wilton instructor at a senior citizen's apt complex.  Then private lessons from another decorator.  All this way pre-internet:)  I continued to take lessons as they presented themselves over the yrs.

Before any lessons reading books just made NO sense to me.  Once I had some 12 wks of lessons under my belt I could understand most of what the books were trying to say.