Wedding Cake Bash or Crash?

Ok, so I've been waiting to blog about last week's wedding cake because I wasn't sure how to approach it. So, I'm just going to start at the beginning. About six years ago...just kidding, I'll save you the how we knew the bride and groom and jump into the cake fairy tale nightmare. We were asked to do a wedding cake for a couple of our friends months ago. This, as some of you may know, would be our first wedding cake. We accepted the challenge which quickly turned from not just a cake but a five tier wedding cake, 150 cupcakes, 120 cake pops, and "as many brownie pops as we can get." I don't have that much room in my little fridge or my house for that matter, but if you know me, I have a hard time saying no. Shopping and prep started months ago but the real fun began on June 20, 2010. Baker Man took the week off from the fire department to ensure we could achieve our task. Monday, June 21, 4:00 PM when I, Cake Lady, got off work, we made our final trip to the Cake Art Party Store. Tuesday, June 22- I took the day off work to help with cake/cupcake/cakepop/brownie pop baking and prep. Mimi watched the munchkins and we got to work. Our oven was on ALL day long leaving our house at approximately melting temperature for humans. Luckily we were able to get just about everything baked in one day...well for the most part. June 23- Cake Lady went back to the grind at work and Baker Man finished up the last of the baking and started making icing...LOTS of icing. Our freezer has been filled to the brim with cake/brownie pops. June 24: I took the day off work again so Baker Man and I can get down to business and a friend takes the kids for the day. We iced all cupcakes, made cupcake decor, iced cakes, decorated some, ran up and down the stairs to our freezer a million times (you know since I'm supposed to be training for a triathlon). So, the end of day four or is this five...we had three of the five tiers done, cake/brownie pops completed, cupcakes check...very sleepy. Friday June 25-Cake Lady off work again (with no pay might I add) by 4:00 I could see the chaos coming to an end...a light at the end of the tunnel. Little Man was the ring bearer in the wedding and we were supposed to be at the church for rehersal at 6:00. Baker Man and I thought we would go ahead and take everything to the church because they were going to allow us to use the fridge for cupcakes, cake/brownie pops and whatever else we needed. We got the and decided we would go ahead and set up the cake so we could take our time and have one less thing to have to worry about for game day. We set it up and headed to rehearsal which lasted until about 8:30-8:45 PM. The bride and groom couldn't wait to see the cake so we took them to the reception room and she almost started crying. "It's beautiful!" she squeeled! We went on to rehearsal and had to dip out early when the kids started to become unglued at about 10:30 PM. The bride wanted everyone at the church at 8:30 AM the next morning so all bridesmaids could get ready together and start pictures by 11:00 AM. Little Man was needed no later than 11:30 AM for pictures with the groom/bridal party. So...first person arrived at 8:30 AM...went to take a looksy at the cake, and there she was, standing tall, in all her glory...all five tiers. Mother of the Bride (or MOB) also saw it and tears (it must run in the family to cry when you see a cake). Then...at about 11:00 AM, we were getting ready to head to the church for Little Man's big debut when our phone rang...it was MOB..."the cake...it crashed." My heart started pounded and tears started flowing...I'm starting to think cakes just have that affect on people. Baker Man says, "We're on our way to see what we can do." We get in the car and all I can think is...how are we going to fix what has taken us a week to prepare. We started calling Publix to see if there was any way we could get some plain cakes on the fly. We arrived at the church with half of our kitchen and I walked into the reception room where all the groom's men were gathered around the demolished cake as if they were at some memorial service...REALLY??!?! Can you please get out of here before start sobbing and use your neck tie as a tissue. No kidding...it looked as though some 300 lb football player got down into his "let's do this" stance and plowed over the cake. How is this possible?! It stood tall and proud for over 14 hours...and then gravity just decided to cause it to plumit to it's death?! Well, however it happened we had to do something! The bottom tier was fine...untouched even. The next one was still standing but we couldn't manage to save it. The middle tier cake was fine but the icing and decor...not so much. So, we scraped it off and started making icing. The top two looked as though they were hit by a mack truck and then picked over by wild hyenas while laughing in my face. We found a Publix that could get us three iced cakes without decorations in one hour. Baker Man took off and returned with three cakes...we decorated them and were able to get a five tier cake up just seconds before the ceremony began...here's the before and after...

Five tier wedding damask wedding cake before the cake decided to pull a humpty dumpty

After all the kings horses and all the kings men...

And, here's the rest of the sweetest things we had there that didn't attempt cake suicide...

Cake Pops (idea from Bakerella)

Damask Cupcake Stand (directions on how to build this stand found on Ellez Designs)

Close up of the Monogram Letter Cupcakes

And the other Monogram Letter Cupcakes

So, lesson Cakes on the Corner will take away from June 26, 2010...swallow your pride and get down on your knees and thank God for Publix!