Cake Decorating Class 2 and 3...Getting ready for my final!

The last 2 weeks have been a crazy one and here's a little of what I've been working on. I've been taking a cake decorating class and its been keeping me quite busy spending 2-3 hours to get ready for it each week- baking, making icing, cleaning the tips and bags after each use, practicing what I've done and making sure that Ryan's work eats all of the treats in time for the next week- they're keeping up so far!

Week 2 involved cutting a cake in half horizontally and then filling it with icing, covering the whole thing with icing and then transferring a design onto it so I could decorate it for a birthday at Ryan's work. Here's a little of what it looked like afterwards as well as the cupcakes that I made most recently for the third week of class. This week, we'll be learning how to make roses (which will come in handy around Valentines Day) and then decorating our final cake in time for the second class which starts the following week.

Before- This is what it looks like before I take it home and continue working on it. I did this much in class and then decided that I can do better than this!

After- This is what it looked like after I worked on it for about 20 minutes after I got home. 

What the side of the cake looks like after I worked on it at home. This encompasses most of what I learned in the second class.

My first cake EVER! I actually love this cake!

Some of the cupcakes I made in Week 3 with my flowers I learned!

A close up of the shaggy mums flowers- one of my favorites. I think they are soo beautiful and fluffy looking even though they are only made of icing!

Some of the pansies and rosettes that I learned in week 3. I think the pansies look so pretty and dainty, and of course they taste amazing!

A menagerie of what I did when I got home from my third class. I had 18 more to decorate after class so I was busy for quite some time and had tons of fun doing it!

I love these designs because they are so simple- circles, lines, etc but I love them so much! I love the bright blues and yellows as well...makes them POP!

A mixture of flowers that I've learned over the past few weeks- I am practicing for my final cake which will happen this week! I'm so excited to showcase all I've learned in 3 weeks and to move onto the next course!

I think I'll know how to make these from now on- I made 2 trays of these. I love making the leaves because they have such a wonderful look to them and give the flowers that feel to make them look real...I love doing this type of stuff!

This is something I learned in the first or second week and wanted to review before I wanted to do them on the final cake. I think these type of borders make cakes look so sophisticated and feel that it adds that little extra PUNCH to a cake to make them look professional. I truly feel like I'm a pro now and this is only the first course!