An Old Lady With A Big Nose

Nancy is a very good friend of mine who I met about 11 years ago, she is closer to me than a sister.  When she was turning 50 last year (2010), she asked me to make her cake. I agonized over it a bit because I wanted it to be perfect, I wanted to please her, but more importantly, I wanted to impress her. 

After thinking about a designed, I called to talk it over with her. She was planning a party at a local restaurant and was inviting 15-20 people.  I told her that I hadn't come up with a design yet, but that I kept coming to the idea that a cake for her had to be elegant. She was touched by my desire to express my impression of her with elegance, but quickly stated her desire to have an old lady with a big nose on her cake.  She wanted this birthday to be fun and full of laughter.  I said, OK, an old lady it is.

I went on a search for an old lady I could draw an image from.  I found a great lady in my kid's book, "Why was I adopted". The lady had a fat face, big nose, a large over coat with a little kid tucked into her pocket book and another kid riding under her arm. 

I drew her full figure and pocket book, minus the kids.  Then, I attempted to transfer the image to the cake. I almost pulled a "cake boss" and wanted to throw the thing on the floor.  I was frustrated because I couldn't tranfer that much detail onto the cake and have it look in proportion. My husband encourgaged me to keep trying and convinced me - it could be done.  I asked him to enlarge the picture and just draw her face and neckline.  I colored frosting black for the outlining, peach for her skin, brown for her coat as well as pink and yellow for her hat, flowers and buttons.  After drawing the outline of the lady and all her facial detail, I filled in with the appropriate color.

Nancy wanted a lemon cake with lemon filling. I thought the lemon filling would be too much lemon so she suggested I use vanilla pudding blended with cool whip. That filling proved to be amazingly refreshing.

When I got the cake to the restaraunt, Nancy didn't want to see it until it was time to sing and cut the cake.  When she saw it, she laughed out loud and thought that was my best every cake for the design as well as the flavor.  It was a winner.  Everyone just loved it.

Ice Fishing Cake for John

John, a single friend was having a big number birthday and we wanted to celebrate. He has been widowed a long time and has family in another area. We thought it would be nice to plan a surprise celebration for him. He loves fishing and most particularly, Ice Fishing. He looks forward to a winter lay off each year so he can do as much ice fishing as he wants.
I wanted to find a cake topper of a guy fishing so I could put it on his cake. After two weeks of looking I found nothing suitable. I decided to change my design just a little and started with a yellow cake. I frosted it with white icing with a simply shell border to add dimension. Then a "frozen pond" made of blue icing set towards one side, with white icing pushed up against it's sides to indicate a snowy edge. I used one of my decorating tips to make a circular impression in the pond area of the cake, to imply a hole had been "cut into the ice". I made a road of Oreo cookie crumbs and pressed the boots of a toy construction working into the frosting walking from one side of the road to the pond and back again on the other side of the road. I piped evergreen trees along the edge of the pond in a few bunches and sprinkled them and the pond with powdered sugar to show it had recently snowed in the area. Then I piped "John Was Here" with white icing on the blue pond. Everyone loved the cake and the design. In their minds, it was perfect. John was thrilled to be treated with such love and even though he doesn't like to be the center of attention, he really was a good sport about it.

Start With A Design

When considering what a cake should look like, there are several questions to answer.

• What is the occasion?
• Who are you celebrating?
• Does the person have any hobbies?
• What are their favorite colors?

As I build this blog, and display my cakes, I will explain how I developed the design for each cake before I ever took out a bowl or pan. Most of the time is spent on the design, which I do in my head, with only a few rough pictures to achieve the correct proportions. I barely use drawings. Some people have more success creating their design on paper. If this is you, then use paper.