Cake Review 2012

Drummmmmmmrolllllllllllllll. . . . 

Ta-da!

D.J. wanted a seemingly simple cake this year. Rounded corners are harder than they look. He was going for height I think. It's nearly as tall as the box you see on the table, so I consider it successful!

Spencer tries to give me a real challenge every year. He requested Han Solo frozen in carbonite.  I knew a cake Han Solo would be more cartoonish, but I did my best make it recognizable. 

I was in a frantic frenzy trying to figure out how to pull this one off.  I came up with covering a doll (a Pochahontus doll to be exact, with a flattened chest and cut hair) with aluminum foil and placing it in a cut out.  I had to pull the hands off a Voldemort figure we had because Pocahontus's hands were too dainty. Then it was just an issue of molding the fondant around the figure.

Mark's brother David has a birthday on Dec 22nd.  So while he was in town for the Christmas holiday, he celebrated his 40th birthday.  Lieve sent an email about a surprise dinner and after I read that email to Mark, he said, "We should make him a cake!" He searched the internet for cakes for 40 year olds and found this one:

But I didn't think David would think it's funny and I really didn't want to make fondant poop.  So we opted for a more sophisticated personality cake with some of his interests and hobbies:

 Starting with the "4", David works with DNA, he loves Moab and Mac products, and he currently works with heat maps (the green and red item). Spanning the "4" and "0" is the golden gate bridge representing time he spent in San Francisco. The "0" has a snowboard on a mountain at the top, a kayak running down the left side and a mountain bike laying on a trail on the right. Happy 40th Dave!

James figured out that if he asks for a cake with toys on it, he usually gets the toy for his birthday.  So he asked for a Lego Batman cake with the good guys and bad guys fighting on a mountain where Batman's cave is located.  I was planning on this for four months (he notified me very early on), and then two weeks before his birthday, he decided he wanted a different toy/wii game and wanted to switch the cake!! This was unacceptable to me! We stuck with the Batman cake and figured out he just wanted an additional present.

I couldn't just have Batman and Bane fighting violently, so they are having a snowball fight. James also likes penguins so I had to make Penguin out of fondant because that figure didn't come with the Lego set!