As you will have seen in
this post I have made lots of cakes over the years, mainly for my 2 children, now aged 22 and nearly 25. Two weeks ago my daughter came up from Essex for Matt's birthday tea party and as we were chatting said to me, "Mum you made me a promise years ago....I am going to ask if you will keep to it?" Now that really got me thinking..what on earth was it....did I promise her money, a house, new shoes.....!? Well the answer came, "You always told me that you would never make my wedding cake, as that is just too much to be doing whilst getting things ready for the big day, but you would make me an engagement cake. Will you do that for us?". I do actually remember saying this, she was probably about 12 or 13 years old at the time. You will all remember that Milly and Tom did actually get engaged in December but the planned engagement lunch was cancelled due to the heavy snow. I assumed, what with Christmas and all the celebrations that that was it.
Well apparently not...they decided they really missed not celebrating their engagement with all their friends and family so they have planned an Engagement Party in mid April and yes, yours truly will be finally making that promised Engagement cake!
I had such fun showing you my old cake creations I made Matt that I thought now would be a great chance to share some I have made Milly over the years. It was a real trip down Memory Lane looking at Matt's old cakes and I must admit these have been the same for me. As before I'm afraid the photos are very poor quality as they are old "developed" photos which I have scanned and put onto my computer. Nothing like the qualitty of the photos from my new camera, which I am just loving playing with.
So here we go..this is not the first cake I made her but it was one of the first themed cakes. It was her 4th Birthday (1990) and Milly always loved Beatrix Potter and especially the Tale of Jeremy Fisher. It was her first "big" party where we hired the little local hall and of course she chose to have Jeremy on her cake.
This was taken before we transported the cake up to the hall. He had a separate fishing rod which I then threaded the line through but unfortunately I never did take that photo- I was probably too busy hosting party games with 20 excited 4 year olds!(You can enlarge any of the photos by double clicking on them to see the little details).
By her 5th birthday she had caught the "Disney Bug" and that year we had "The Little Mermaid" with Ariel the Mermaid on top. I can remember spending hours making little sea creatures out of icing to put round the edge. My Matt was a 1 year old at the time and every afternoon he had his afternoon sleep I would make a few more and show them to him when he woke. I am not sure he understood where they came from at the time!
Birthday number 6 was part Disney part A.A.Milne as Milly has always loved Winnie the Pooh ( and I of course love dear Piglet). We had an afternoon tea scene of them having a party. The food was fiddly but fun to make and the candle holders were honeypots I made out of fondant icing.
Disney's Beauty and the Beast was the theme for her 7th birthday and I decided to incorporate a plaque I made again out of fondant icing. By that age I was working part time whilst both children were at school so time was getting a little shorter for me to made the incredibly elaborate figures. I did make sugar roses to stand the candles in though.
By the time Milly's 11th birthday arrived Disney was no longer so popular and her cake featured my interpretation of her ballet shoes. Milly danced from the age of 2 1/2 and only gave up 2 years ago when she moved from London. She danced through her primary and secondary school years and even through medical school and only gave up when she became a junior doctor. Believe me contrary to what the press may say they work
long hours. She did many exams and even danced at White Lodge, home of the Royal Ballet School, London at some of their training days.
Her 12th Birthday was during the Teletubby craze and yes even 12 year olds loved them. I even managed to buy her a Tinkiwinkie doll which at the time were scarcer than hen's teeth! This was such a fun cheerful cake.
So here I am 13 years later designing an Engagement cake for my darling daughter. Where did all that time go...but what happy memories are stirred by looking at some of my old cakes.
I have been busy ordering some new cutters..here is a sneaky peep...
And yesterday I had a play cutting out some hearts using some left over green icing from Matt's cake...
I have played with using textures, different thicknesses and also cutting one heart into another - I quite like this effect.
As you can see I already have a theme and no it's not Disney ;0). I have bought some lovely bright red icing I shall make the hearts for the real thing. I also have an idea for the top but that's under wraps for now.
All will be revealed in due course.
So I will be busy working on this over the next few weeks. I will really enjoy creating something special for Milly and Tom's Engagement cake. It is something I am really glad I did promise to do and also that my daughter still wants me to keep to it..after all that was a promise I made many, many years ago!
Bye for now,
Jane x
