Pretty Royal Flowers

In this week's Wilton class, we made flowers! The apple blossoms and the the primroses were really pretty, but it was the rosebud that really got my attention. I couldn't figure out how to make those darn things for the longest time, but it turns out they're really easy! I just needed to see someone do it in person and then have them watch me to it. Such a pretty effect, too!



Next week we're making daffodils and roses, I think, which I am also excited about. This class is turning out to be a lot more fun than the fondant one. :)



Oh, and, shout out to my instructor, Mary! :-D

Flowers & Cake Design (Part 1)

Well, I started my final Wilton class this past Monday. I'm a quarter of the way done with flowers & cake design and I'm actually really excited for this class. There's a lot of flowers that we'll be doing out of buttercream (or royal icing), and I never really got the hang of the piped flowers when I tried to teach myself. Hopefully I'll be a faster learner with an instructor who's going over the step by step instructions with me.

 This is the pansy that we made. I think this is actually upside down, but I don't really know. I like pansies a lot in real life (my grandma always plants tons of them) but I'm kind of iffy about this gumpaste one. First of all, the gumpaste started to harden and crack before I finished ruffling the petals, so that was a total buzzkill. I also feel like the sizing of the flower is off.



My biggest complaint about this class is that there is a lot of redundancy when you take the Flowers class and the Fondant class (weren't they supposed to fix that?). You even get a lot of the same tools. I'm quite miffed about that; I'd rather get some new tools that Wilton suggests you buy, but they don't actually put in your kit, like the 9" rolling pin or the tapered spatula.



You also have to re-learn a lot of the same skills: how to tint gumpaste, how to make gum-glue, etc. So totally boring if you've taken the gumpaste class already.



And the button flower? I've got mixed feelings about this guy. First of all: SUPER CUTE. I can't wait to use it with this mold for a cake I've been wanting to make for Katie for a couple of years now. But the way the flower cutter is set up is SUCH A PAIN. Also, I don't understand why you don't make this flower in the fondant/gumpaste class either. If anyone can figure that out for met, let me know!

Anyone else taken this class? Did you like it? Was it hard to make the "Wilton rose?" (I really hope I can finally master that elusive flower!)

Mums & Dasies

Kind of a weird picture of my hand at a weird angle, but here is some photographic evidence of the gumpaste flowers I made in the Wilton class.



Let me give you my personal opinion on these flowers, which you may or may not agree on...



The mum? It looks weird. I had no ideas what real mums looked like until my own mom showed me some in our front yard. They are weird looking (although tiny) flowers. I'm still convinced my mum looks like a pink artichoke.



Has anyone ever had a cake with mums on it, or made someone else a mum cake? Can anyone please give me some helpful hints to make this flower look better? Or maybe I should just write it off as one of those things I'll never be able to create.



The daisy was cute. I like how it has yellow sprinkles on it for the center, but I'm not a big fan of the Wilton daisy cutter. It doesn't give very clean lines. (I do like this other one, though.) The flower formers were nice, though!



So, out of all the flowers we made in the gumpaste class, the roses were my favorite, followed by the calla lily. The next flower I'd like to tackle is the tulip, which I have no idea how to do, so if you happen to stumble upon a tulip tutorial on youtube or something, send it to me!! They're my favorite flower, and I'd love to put them on a cake! :)



Also, Wilton is phasing out their old flower set for this new (and more expensive) one. I've got the old one, which I've really only used once, and I'm wondering if the new one is worth the extra tools. It's got dogwood and hydrangea and tiger lily cutters, all of which seems different and fun (but no daffodil or tulip cutters...not that I could figure out how to use then anyway, but still...). Then again, maybe I should just save up to get the higher quality (and also more expensive) metal cutters. Thoughts?



I wish they sold some (or all) of those cutters individually. For example, the large rose cutter. I'd like to get that one, because the cutter I got in my class kit only makes small roses. Then again, I could always buy the larger rose cutter at work. I'll probably end up doing that, and since I've worked with that one before, I know what I'm getting myself into!

Pretty Little Flowers

So yesterday's Wilton class was awesome. I mean, just look at this gorgeous rose that I made! Having someone help me walk through all the steps was definitely a big help (especially compared with the roses I tried making on my own) and I remembered a lot of the advice Shelley gave during one of her demos last summer.

The key to realistic looking flowers, it turns out, is super thin gumpaste...

Maybe don't look at the carnation. The example our instructor showed us was much prettier/more life like. Mine just looks like wadded up tissues...

I just need more practice!

But the calla lilly is cute!

I love these flowers because they're so unusual :)

So that's what I did last night. I also talked myself out of buying a $130 airbrush machine that Duff offers... I'll wait until I have a 50% off coupon! Has anyone else bought this particular version before? Or even used an airbrush machine? I'd like to play around with the one at work, but I currently have zero experience airbrushing cakes. Any suggestions/anecdotes are welcome! :)

Ribbon Roses

Something Youtube was never able to teach me: Ribbon roses

I finished my cake decorating course!



And you know what? I did learn something from it.



I learned how to make roses.



And ok, not the 'traditional' buttercream roses that you see everywhere, and the kind that I've been trying to master for 4 or 5 years. But they're still roses none-the-less. And I still made them! :)



And yes, my co-workers did tease me a lot for spending money on the class. (Thank you, Mom & Dad!!!) And yes, they can (and have) teach me so much more about decorating (and the cool thing is that I get paid to learn it and I'm having fun and I work with amazing and talented people and I'm basically just living the dream right now...) I'm just trying to diversify my portfolio of skills, and sometimes you have to take a refresher course before you can learn the advanced stuff. I have a feeling I won't be so good at the fondant/gumpaste class I'm taking next.



So, overall, I'd say the Wilton class was fun. Kind of a pain to get all the icing and tips and everything ready before class. But once I was there, it was a good way to spend 2 hours a week.



Am I crazy for voluntarily decorating cakes after spending 40 hours a week doing that as my job? Probably.



But no one said following your passion would keep you sane. ;)