My niece's 18th birthday party

It was the morning of my niece's 18th birthday party.  I was frosting the cake and I couldn't get it to be smooth.  In my frustration, I started scraping the frosting off so I could start over but in the process of doing so, I accidentally sliced off a big chunk of cake from the side!  At that point, I began to panic.  If I acted quickly though, I still had time to bake another cake so off I went to get eggs from the fridge, only to find out we had ran out....

That was the moment I woke up....yes, it was just a nightmare!  Phew!

It was actually the morning of my niece's party yesterday (for real).  I had already finished baking and frosting 80 red velvet cupcakes the night before and had to empty our fridge to fit everything in. I still had to assemble the two-tiered cake.  I had been a little anxious about this (which explains why I had the terrible dream, I suppose).

To be honest, the party planning was a bit all over the place.  There was no specific colour scheme - the invitation was peach, my niece's dress was burgundy, the place cards were cream, the flowers were white, pink, fuschia, and red!

I decided to go with the peach. Weeks before, I had already planned on paper what I wanted the cake to look like.  Simple, straightforward, clean design.  Something I could handle without stressing too much.

6" and 8" 3-layered cakes, gumpaste ruffle flowers, '18' topper and stars.

I made the decorations in advance so those were dry, solid and ready to go.  The cake?  Easier drawn than done! It was raining all night and yesterday was a gloomy, cold day.  If there's one thing I really dislike about frosting a cake, it is doing it in this weather!  In my experience, probably because of the water in the air, even if my frosting is made in the right consistency, it becomes hard to spread rather quickly.  I turned the heater on to help dry out the air somehow.  I still had difficulty but I think it all worked out in the end.  By 1:00 pm, the cake was boxed and ready.

My daughter and I went to the venue about an hour or so before the start of the party to set up.  The place was absolutely beautiful!  I was excited because it was actually the very first time I would get to see my work displayed in a party this big.

I reckon my niece really liked them - when it was her turn to say a few words to the guests, she thanked me first ahead of everyone else!  I couldn't be more stoked and proud.

It wasn't until probably 9:30 to 10 pm did we get to sing 'happy birthday' then people started taking pictures of and with the cake :).

We had a wonderful night. My back hurts today but now it's Sunday and it's again time to plan for the week ahead.

Hope you all have a great weekend!