This was supposed to be quick and easy...

A simple 2 layer cake for a 90th birthday party.  Nothing fancy, so we decided just flat flowers.  OK, baked and filled the cake, no problems.  Frosted the cake, no problems.  Unless of course you count the fact that a 10x14 board is a little tight for a 9x13 cake.  I'll have to remember that next time. 

Added reverse shell border on top, no problems.  Wait, must have placed border just over the edge....as I'm working on the flowers I notice part of the border on the back is falling off!  I carefully remove and re-pipe a new border in that section and put the cake in the refrigerator hoping the buttercream will stiffen enough to hold everything in place. 

30 minutes later....border looks OK.  Onto the flowers.  Should be easy, use a cookie cutter to "mark" the shape of the flower in the buttercream then outline and fill with simple stars.  Yeah, easy.  I had to use the medium size cutter because the cake was only 9x13 and after filling in with stars they looked like big blobs!  Deep breath...scrape off the frosting...new plan.  Move onto the lettering.

I practice on paper about 10 times trying to keep the 90 centered and why can't happy and birthday have the same number of letters?!  In the end I think it looks ok.  If only she hadn't drawn me a picture of the cake then I wouldn't have felt obligated to put the words at a slant like that.  At first my 9 looks like a g.  Happy goth birthday, great!  Scrape, scrape...9 with a straight line, check.  Time to walk away.

30 minutes later...new idea for the flowers.  I'll pipe circles for each petal and flatten slightly, then add a center circle.  Are they the best flowers I've made?  No but I'm out of ideas and once I add the vines, leaves and small flowers on the sides I'm comfortable with the way it looks.

Serves me right for thinking I could go out for dinner after work, come home and easily put this cake together in an hour or so.  As far as cake decorating goes these are minor problems but after a long day, when it's 10pm, they seem a little bigger than they actually are, and it's easy to get stressed.  I've learned when I'm getting frustrated it's best to just walk away, take a break and come back fresh in 15 or 30 minutes.  And always plan for your plan to change!