Carnival Birthday Cake

In one of my previous post I spoke on making a cake for my nephews first b-day (btw...I did find out that his b-day was on May 20th). There are a few things I would do differently based on this experience. This was also my first time decorating a cake like this...3D I assume.  The good thing is, I know what should be done differently next time, and I was also rushing... a lot, I wasn't as prepared because I was asked to do the cake 6 days before and didn't have all the supplies I needed. Originally I was asked to make a Very Hungry Caterpillar cupcake cake. Then later that day it changed and I had to scramble during the week to get everything I needed, plus start on certain pieces of the cake. Enough with the talking here's the nephews cake. 

Sorry...the lighting was bad, but this was the only place in my kitchen that didn't look like a bakery exploded. 

The writing is so pretty!!!  Obviously I have very nice hand writing, but it NEVER comes out like that on cakes.  I was going really slow and actually had to remove the first 3 letters I piped to start over. This is definitely something I'll have to practice more of.....

Yes my fondant creased...more practicing of course. 

Elephants, popcorn, and fondant creases, oh my!!!  I'm going to purchase dummy cakes. There's no way I'm not going to perfect laying fondant on a cake!

This was suppose to be on the cake but would have been too much for a 9". So I spray painted a piece of styrofoam and placed the remaining of the pieces on there.  By the time we sung Happy Birthday, the cake was still in tip top condition, however I could tell that the popcorn bag was starting to sink into the cake a little. I only used 1 wooden dowel in the center to hold it in place. If I ever make this cake again, I'll have to stick some in the cake to support the bottom of the popcorn bag. 

I must say, what an experience and learning tool.  I'm happy I did it and was able to execute it.