This was a combined cake was for my lovely little niece who turned 2 and Ben whose birthdays are only one day apart. It meant I got to use some of the equipment and techniques I gathered in America (from doing the Wilton courses).

Actually in these photos the cake is not quite complete - I added a sign, and a butterfly which I painted with food colouring. I realised afterwards that I should have diluted the dye with vanilla essence instead of water but I've learnt my lesson and will do it right next time. Still, it was good enough.

Actually in these photos the cake is not quite complete - I added a sign, and a butterfly which I painted with food colouring. I realised afterwards that I should have diluted the dye with vanilla essence instead of water but I've learnt my lesson and will do it right next time. Still, it was good enough. Not the best photo but here is the completed cake.

Here's the Yosemite themed cake I made for Ben's birthday (we went there last month . It's a chocolate cake with buttercream icing and decorations made of gumpaste and buttercream.

I used the chunk I cut out of the centre to make 'Half Dome'. You can just see Mirror Lake down there at the bottom, and I also had a few white buttercream waterfalls going down the inside. The grey buttercream is black food colouring half mixed in. Rocks are gumpaste with black colouring that is not fully mixed. Tents and climbers are gumpaste. I used some of the wire for making flowers as climbing rope which held the little guys on the cake. I had to do some last minute neck surgery but after that he was fine ;)

The trees have a cone shaped base made of gumpaste that I tinted green. I put a toothpick into the base and painted the part that would be visible with brown food colouring. Then I piped the green starting from the bottom and moving up in rows. The toothpicks made it really easy to attach them to the cake and looked just like trunks anyway.

The little bear was trickiest of all and looked nothing like a bear until I got that lighter patch around the nose on. After that he was looking okay and I added the nose, ears and eyes (dotting the pupils with a food writer).

This was definitely one of the funnest cakes I've made!

It's hard to believe my 2 months in Atlanta are almost over. All of my lovely things I've bought are safely tucked away in suitcases and I'm just about ready to go home. This trip I have done calligraphy, hand sewing and some polymer clay miniatures, but most of all - cake decorating! I took some of the Wilton courses offered at Michael's which were fantastic.

Here are some of the flowers I made from gumpaste.

Stargazer Lily

Calla Lily

Briar Rose (before colouring the edges)

Gerbera, Pansies (the colour faded from violet to blue~!), and blossom of no particular variety.

Wired posy with briar rose, sweet pea, stephanotis flowers (broken petals, oops!) and buds, ivy leaves. 

...And my rose. Check out how much the colour changed as it dried.

For this rose I actually followed a youtube tutorial - here (2 parts). I also made some other flowers but these are the ones I was most happy with. Can't wait to do more of these at home!