Grandfather Tree Cake

June 17 & 18, 2007

Next up, a Grandfather tree Cake. On Friday night, very late, I baked the cake, let is cool and stored it overnight.

On Saturday, I made some butter cream out of butter, tons of confectioners sugar, a tablespoon of milk and a teaspoon of vanilla. VERY hard to blend and one of my least favorite things to make.

Friday night's cake was cut into four (un)even pieces. Then David trimmed the crust off all the pieces and trimmed the top where the cake had risen.

The 4 cake pieces were piled on top of each other with butter cream (THAT was a pain. The butter cream kept tearing the cake) and the corners were trimmed off to make it more "tubular." The corners that were cut were attached to the base of the cake to make the tree trunk roots.

Next, we took a pound and a half of fondant, cut it in half and each of use kneaded it with brown food coloring. We looked like taffy-pullers. It took a while to get it just the right shade of brown. The fondant was then rolled flat and wrapped around our tubular cake and the excess cut off. We used our fingers to shape the fondant around the "roots and crevices" of the cake. Am I not sexy in my glasses, crazy hair and "cleaning day outfit?" It's what I wear when I clean with bleach & stuff so I don't ruin other clothes. I had cleaned and mopped three bathrooms. Relax! I wore gloves and washed my hands after, too. David took a knife and cut the lines and grooves in our tree.

Next up. I added the face using left-over brown fondant. He looked creepy. :( I tried making him a little nicer.

From Kaaren's Kakes

We colored some modeling paste black and attached them to the base of the tree to make the tree's "hidey-holes." We added black to the inside of the mouth as well. I also added two large branches, some extra roots and vines, and some "steps" for the little critters to get into their hidey-hole homes.

(David's out mowing the lawn at this point). I colored some modeling paint yellow-green and made three apples. These were attached to the two new branches. I colored some modeling paste darker green and cut out the leaves for the apples and stuck them on.

David missed the fun part. Not. I had to color fondant green and spread it around the tree for grass. Then I had to take a star tip and poke each and every inch of that green fondant to make it look like grass. It was long, tedious work.

I made sticks out of the left-over brown fondant for the birds nest on top. I arranged them in a nest shape. David's still outside mowing and I kept forgetting to take pictures. I made two little blue birds, as well as two white & blue marbled eggs and placed them inside the nest.

The Hedgehog family was a pita & they came out yucky, but oh well. There they are. They look mad. :)

Sunday Morning, Isabel and I head down for breakfast, leaving daddy alone to sleep in (one of his Father's Day presents, I suppose). :) He loves his sleep. The squirrel was next. I sat him on the large left branch & had a heck of a time keeping the tail up. I ended up using a piece of spaghetti to pin it to the tree.

The bees! Argh! This was so hard. They are so tiny. I got aggravated doing this. That & Isabel wanted to help but the pieces are so small, she kept squishing the heads. I had to make four! Ugh!

I made Mister Mole popping out of his hidey-hole. Next came the mouse peeping out of the trees mouth. He came out cute too. The bunnies were next.

Then came the dusting. Brown dust on the hedgehogs, the tree, roots and the bird's nest. Black dust around the mole's head. Green petal dust on the leaves, the grass and red dust on the apples. I added eyes to the bees and the bunnies.

Here is the finished product. You can click on all these pictures on this post to make them bigger.

Me & My creation. Again, I *wish* these were my actual inventions. Alas, I am not that talented. These are all from the VERY talended Debbie Brown's book, "Enchanted Cakes for Children".