Last week was Anastasia’s 3rd birthday,we had a party for her on Saturday, and here’s the cake… well cakes. The Rani one is for Anastasia and the Elmo cake was for my nephew Alekos’ first birthday, just a couple of months late.

You see Alekos’ Birthday was in October, and I’d planned to have this Elmo cake done then, but unfortunately he was unwell, we thought measles, and had to postpone his party. Luckily I had enough notice that I hadn’t actually started the cake yet. As the new party date approached everything seemed to be going ok so I started making the cake, but just before the day the poor kid got sick again so the party was canceled, leaving me with a half finished cake in the freezer. I had planned to finish it at some point before we went to town so I could take it to him, after all even without a party Alekos could still enjoy the cake, But leading up to each trip to town I was too busy to work on it, and on the two occasions Alekos came to visit us I didn’t have enough notice.

So I came to the planning stage of Anastasia’s cake, and I realized that I might not have enough room in the freezer for both cakes. That meant I would have to either complete Elmo, or potentially throw it out (or take it to the old folks as I did with the practice lion). Since there wasn’t too much work to be done on it, and Alekos would be here for Anastasia’s party I realised it was the perfect opportunity to finish it and be able to give it to Alekos. The only problem was that I’d have to allow enough time to make two cakes.

So I planned to have Anastasia’s Rani cake finished on Thursday, finish Elmo on Friday, ready for the party on Saturday. But things never seem to go to plan…

As I’m just getting started on a new cake, I thought I’d post some of my previous ones…

When I was young I always made cakes for my family, especially my little sister as she grew up. After not making any for a few years I was excited to make birthday cakes for my own kids. This is Anastasia’s 2nd birthday cake from December last year.

Even a few months ago though, I had little idea about 3d sculpted cakes, I barely knew they existed let alone had any thoughts of making them. Just before my youngest’s 1st birthday a friend showed me some 3d cakes she’d made using fondant. I was amazed at what she’d done and what was possible. I made, what I sure was, the most elaborate Dorothy the Dinosaur cake ever made (little did I know).

Proud of what I’d done, but having learned a great deal from the mistakes I’d made, I started to investigate further, scouring the net for more examples and information. I couldn’t believe my eyes. What I’d made was quite basic compared to many of the creations I’d found, and I’d found a new passion. I had to learn more. I spent a few weeks absorbing as much as I could, seeing what was possible, trying to find out how it had been done, and planning how I could use all this new information to make bigger and better cakes. A friends birthday was coming up, a great opportunity to get some more practice in. I was a bit bolder with this one, which unfortunately came back to haunt me…