If I knew you were coming I’da baked a cake.

So I’ve been taking this Wilton cake decorating class at Hobby Lobby. I graduated from Course I last night! Yay for me! I enjoyed it so much that I signed up for Course II, so off into the wild world of royal icing I will go.

I’ve been having issues with my cakes – mostly because of the actual CAKE part and not the icing. I tried using Betty Crocker with pudding in the mix on the 1st one and it was so sticky and gooey that the icing would roll right off of it. I decided on my 2nd attempt to make a cake from scratch like a dummy. That cake tasted like dry crumbly cornbread. I also used butter flavored icing, so I had buttery Crisco dry crumbly cornbread cake. Umm Umm Good. On my 3rd and final attempt (The Graduation cake) I got it just right. I went back to Betty Crocker, minus the pudding, and used lemon flavored cake and icing. It was perfection. Here is a photo journey of my progress:

So, obviously, this is my first cake. I love the Care Bear-esqueness about it, don’t you? It’s like any minute Cheer Bear and Birthday bear are going to come frolicking out from behind the poofy white cloud of powdered sugary Crisco goodness yelling “CARE BEARS, SHAAAAARE!!!!!!!” while Funshine Bear and Good luck Bear slide down the rainbow. Ahhh I loved the Care Bears. Man, and don’t get me started on My Little Ponies.

Now onto Week 2 to the scary buttery crisco dry crumbly cornbread clown cake.

I learned that if you squeeze big blobs of icing and stick a plastic head on top you can call it a clown. I also learned how to stripe the bag of icing with color to do two-toned and tricolored icing and apparently that made me very happy.

Last night was my graduation cake. This was my pièce de résistance. I finally mastered the Wilton Rose, after many many failed attempts.

I got a little crazy with the greenery, but that’s ok.

I’m so proud of me!

And here is the result of all my hard work…. As soon as I cut into it, my family and coworkers devoured this sucker in .425 seconds flat.