Car Cake and Stockyards Pictures

Well, I had a bit of a challenge last week! I had an order for my first sculpted car cake! I had no idea how to do one so I found some tutorials (See last week's post). This is how it turned out. Next time I will make myself a checklist of details I want to add to make sure I don't forget anything!

This will be a quick tutorial since I I don't have much time.  I baked 2 9x13 cakes and a square I think 7 in cake.  Next time I will just do one 9x13 since my filling smooshed out through my fondant while I was decorating and I burned one of the 9x13s since it was so small.  I made two cake recipes.  I blew up a picture of the car to help me guide my shape while cutting.

I trimmed just a little at a time and rounded the edges.  Did you notice my new vintage apron I'm wearing?  I got it at a thrift shop for a $1!  I always wear a bandanna over my hair to keep hair out of my food, also since it is so long I will also braid it or put it in a bun since hair can fall out of pony tails!  Do you like my huge knife?  It was a gift from my DH years ago!

I had a lot of scraps left over after carving.  I lightly frosted my cake and took extra frosting with me since my friends don't like the fondant it was peeled off before eating and then more frosting applied.

I rolled out my fondant and put it on the car.  I smoothed it down with a fondant smoother.  For the windows I marbled some gray and black fondant.  I put a black strip on the back of the car since that is the way the pictures looked.  I also indented the lines for the trunk, hood, lights (they were closed), and doors.

I outlined the wheel area and pushed it in with my fingers and put round, black tires there.  Next time I will put spokes on the wheel.  On the front I put brake lights and a place for his license plate.  I made a bumper and tail lights for the back.  I forgot to make the door handles!  uggh!  Next time I will outline all the windows with black fondant too.  I made another cake for serving also.  Since I had carved so much off the cake I ended up having to bake an extra cake at 11:00.  I was up until after 1 am decorating this cake and then had church the next morning.  I also made rear view mirrors that I stuck in with toothpicks.

The reason I was doing the cake so late that night is because my husband and I went to the Stockyards in Ft Worth to celebrate our 15th wedding anniversary.  We had a lot of fun!

We paid a guy $5 to let me sit on the longhorn so that Chris could take pictures!

Happy Baking!

Missy

First Sculpted Cake

I am making my first sculpted car cake this week!  I have never made a car cake before so I have been searching for tutorials on the web for help.  I'm one of those people that have to have a picture and step by step directions!  Here is what I have found to help me.




Here is a great tutorial!  I think it looks like they just used two layers of cake?  What do you think?
http://sugaredblog.blogspot.com/2009/04/how-to-make-3d-car-cake.html

I like the details on this mini slideshow of make a car cake:
http://www.blackmarketbakery.com/cakegallery.html

If any one has any suggestions for making this cake, let me know!
Happy Baking,
Missy

How To Make A Fabric Flower

I have fallen in love with fabric flowers!  They are so fun to make, I'm still new at it, but I want to share what I have learned so far!  These I made by folding the fabric over.

These I made with just one layer of fabric for a frayed look.

I am going to teach you how to make the one with the folded fabric, although the concept is the same for both.

I cut two small strips for my two smaller flowers out of the blue, then I wanted a double blue and white flower for the top, so I cut the white strip, which was my bottom layer, bigger then my blue strip which was my top layer.  I then folded the flowers over and ironed them down.

I then took my two ends of a folded strip and sewed it together on the machine (It can be done by hand if you don't have a machine).  I was not doing this at first, but it provides a cleaner finish if they are sewn together first.  You then take your sewing needle and stitch around the entire length very closely together (see pictures) and it naturally makes a circle.

Then you sew the middle sides together to close up the hole.  You want to make sure you don't have any holes gaping open under your button, it is supposed to look like a flower after all.  You are almost done!

If you are making two layers of your flower, place them on top of each other.  Then sew on your button.  If your thread was long enough, you will still be using the same needle and thread through the whole process.  Put your thread through the button a few times. 

Then with the thread still attached, position your flower where you want to sew it on your fabric and sew it through the button a few times to make sure it won't come off.




 
 

I then tack the flower on around the circumference to make sure the flower doesn't "crinkle up" in the wash.  Notice my edge where I sewed the two sides together?  That was done by hand and looks sloppy which is why I started doing it by machine first.  That's it!  You're done!  A great finish to any apron or project you are working on!  Flowers are also great for hiding any mistakes you make!  I'm still new at this, so if you have any suggestions, fell free to let me know!
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

How to Make a Ruffle

What do you do with an old pair of jeans and a piece of a sheet?  Make an apron of course!  A friend of mine cut up a pair of her son's jeans into pieces, she was going to make pillows but gave them to me instead!  I had a piece of a gorgeous embroidered sheet that was given to me in a bag of scrap material.  I love scraps!

I used all the material I had for this project, it was just enough.  Isn't this pink material beautiful?  I'm just guessing that it was a sheet, it is pretty stiff though, so I could be wrong.  First I cut a wide strip off the top that I will use for my tie and waist band.  Then I measured my material to go go around about twice on my denim for the ruffle, then cut it with enough left over to make two pockets.  This is not exact!

I took my pieces to my homemaking fellowship at church to work on.  I trimmed up my denim some, notice the curve?  I did not do that on purpose, but left it and used it as the top of my apron.  I hemmed the very bottom only, I liked the frayed look on the edges, so I zig zagged along the sides with my pink thread to keep it from fraying more.  After sewing on my ruffle and tie, I sewed down the side of the apron through the tie and ruffle for reinforcements.

Not everybody sews at the Homemaking Fellowship, here is Susan knitting, and Tabitha is crocheting a blanket for her dad.  "She layeth her hands to the spindle, and her hands hold the distaff.  She maketh herself coverings of tapestry;...She maketh fine linen, and selleth it..."   Proverbs 31:19, 22, 24

I chased that "rabbit" long enough!  Now I'm going to teach you how I made the ruffle.  I used the flowers as my guide because I wanted to make sure they all showed.  I only ironed down the top once, because otherwise I would have covered up the first row of flowers, so I cheated.  I then doubled over the bottom part and ironed it for the hem, then did the same for the sides.  Some people skip this step thinking it takes too much time, I disagree.  It makes your project look cleaner and crisper and instead of using pins, I just iron it, which works with most projects.

I set my sewing machine on the highest or longest stitch setting (I'm not sure what the correct term is).  In my case it is a four.  I then sewed along the bottom of my top fold.  This is where I will be gathering my stitch for the ruffle, so you want a big hem. You can do two of these stitches right on top of each other in case your string breaks.   (I didn't know this until afterwards - whoops!)  This gave me long, loose stitches.

After you sew on your gathering stitch (Which can also be done by hand).  I very gently (you don't want your string to break) grabbed my bobbin string (the string on the bottom) and started pulling gently.  Use your fingers to move the gathers along to the middle of the ruffle.  I pulled from both ends to keep from putting too much strain on the thread.  If your thread does break, you have your back up stitch.  Do not cut your threads when you are done.  I did, and you can see in the last picture my gather had come undone some, I didn't have a back up stitch so I used my fingers to fake it on the denim with straight pins.

I then laid my ruffle on my denim and tried to make it as straight as possible without messing up my gathers.  I started pinning the ruffle on the denim making sure my gathers were even as I went.

I then made sure I had turned my stitch guide back to 3and slowly stitched along the ruffle.  You have to be careful and make sure the gathers are laying the way you want as you sew.  Don't forget to remove your pins before you sew over them.  They break my needles.

For the pockets, I cut two squares the same size.   I ironed a hem with just one turn on three sides and on the top, where my flowers were, I  folded it under twice.  I ironed it all down then I sewed the top of the pocket.  I put the pockets where I wanted them on the denim.  First I folded the denim in half with the pockets in between to make sure the pockets were placed evenly apart.  I then took a ruler and measured to make sure they were an even distance from the top.  I pinned them into place and held the apron up to a mirror to make sure I liked the placement.  I then sewed the sides and bottom.  Be sure to reinforce your stitches at the top to make sure your pockets do not come apart.

I then folded my apron in half and made sure the sides were even.  I had to cut a little off of one side.  I found the middle of my tie and matched it up with the middle of my apron.  (I forgot to take any more pictures of the rest of the apron, though)  I put the material in the middle of the tie and sewed the tie onto the denim.  

Voila - You have an apron made out of old jeans and a sheet!

You can also make the ruffle smaller!  This is my first ever ruffle - yeah!  The pink one is my second!  LOL  I love ruffles!  If you have any tips on ruffles, please share!
Go check out this page http://keepsakesbymelissa.blogspot.com/2010/07/want-piece-of-cake-blogaversary.html  for a chance to win a cricut cake machine!


Happy sewing!
Missy