Count it all JOY!: My latest project!

I thought I would share my latest project with everyone! My cousin Laura recently had a baby shower and I was enlisted to bake the cake! This was a very special event for me because we're expecting at the same time and Laura and I have been very close over the years as she is my only girl cousin my age. She and I were born 7 weeks apart and our children are due 8 weeks apart. :) Laura and Chris are expecting their first child, a little girl, the beginning of April.

So, in planning the shower with Laura's sister-in-laws, we decided to do a "ducky" cake similar to the one I had baked for Daniel's first birthday. However, it was a relatively large shower so we needed more cake than the duck provided so I baked a round base as well.

This was the largest baking project I've undertaken and so it took a LOT of planning and research and preparation! I'll warn you ahead of time - it's gonna be wordy - probably much more than most of you are interested in... But for me this was an important project and one I'm proud of and so I've written the details of what went into it. Here's a look into my work:

Several days before the shower I made the flowers that were to be placed on the cake. The flowers are made with royal icing which dries hard like a piece of candy. This made the flowers so much easier because I didn't have to worry about piping them directly on the cake. I just made a bunch ahead of time and then took the best ones and positioned them on the cake.

The flowers... These were about the size of quarters.

Piping lots of small purple flowers. It's a bit time consuming at the beginning, but totally worth it to not have to pipe them directly on the cake!

The finished flowers with yellow centers piped. They're piped directly onto wax paper and when they are dry they peel right off. Kind like the "dots" candy as one friend compared them to. :)

The two days before the shower I baked the cakes. This is the mold for the ducky cake. You fill the bottom half to almost over flowing with batter and then attach and tie on the top half so that it doesn't pop off during baking. This cake is a Strawberry Cream Cheese Pound Cake - pound cake works well with a molded cake because it is dense and holds its shape well.

With a toddler some of these things take all day and so I really had to work ahead. Daniel was soooooo.... excited about the ducky cake and just cake in general. Though he handled it very well that he didn't get to eat any right away!

This is the first layer of the base. It is a Sour Cream Almond Pound Cake that is a McDowell family (my Mom's side of the family) recipe. This recipe has been used for wedding cakes for many years in my family. It's very moist and rich! As you can see the cake gets a nice brown crust on the top. This had to be cut off to level the cake before stacking.

Day before the shower...ice and decorate the cakes. Here we have the base cake leveled and I've piped a thick ring of icing around the edge to keep my filling from oozing out when I place the second layer on top.

Now the layer is filled with raspberry preserves. I used raspberry because it is a bit tart and helps to balance out the sweetness of the cake!

Here we have the second layer placed and I've crumb-coated the cake (a thin layer of icing to seal in the crumbs - makes putting on the final layer a lot easier!).

Now I've put on the final layer of icing and smoothed it out. Still working on this skill - but truth be told - it doesn't matter too much by the time you get your other decorations on! This cake is done for the day, I was plump tuckered out and frankly ran out of time and so I finished the decorations for the base the day of the shower. Thank goodness my Mom watched Daniel for most of the day or else who knows how much I would have been able to accomplish!

Now moving on to decorating the ducky. You start with the beak and eyes and then move on to the body. The beak is done just with a spatula. The eyes are piped on, whites first and then the blue centers. However, you get the smooth appearance by patting the icing with your finger dipped in cornstarch. A nifty little trick that is really useful! The cornstarch is absorbed into the icing and you are left with a smooth surface, no lines!

Here I'm piping the body with stars. You cover the entire body with stars and then do the wings with a "pull-out" star to give the appearance of feathers. By the way the duck is placed on a cardboard base (cut to size) to make it easy to lift to place on the cake and then easy to remove when you have to cut the cake. This is tedious work, but it looks really great in the end. I like this style of decoration better than simply icing it with a spatula.

And so here you have the finished ducky! Just a few more details to put on to make it look more like a "girl" ducky (since my cousin is expecting a little girl).

Here I've piped on eyelashes and little baby "hair spikes" with a bow to make the duck look more girly. A great idea provided by my cousin (in-law) Deanna. The ducky is now finished! BTW - to get that black icing it works best to start with chocolate icing, that way you don't have to add tons of food coloring! And here I am done for the night!

Morning of the shower - I was up early to work on the base... Just basic shells around the edges and then placing the first round of large flowers. Since the royal icing is hard you just have to pipe a dot of butter cream on the back and then stick them where ever you want on the cake. In the center you can see where I have marked the place for the ducky to go. I also placed 6 dowel rods in the cake to support the weight of the duck.

Here I've finished placing most of the flowers and have also piped the leaves on. The base is now ready to go. I put the ducky cake on the base at the actual location. There was no way I was risking it toppling over on the drive to the location. Especially because of all the curvy and bumpy back roads we had to travel on!