Not so rubber ducky

 I was helping to plan a baby shower for a friend.  I saw this cake and tried convincing her that she should have a baby clothes theme.  However, she wanted ducks.  Which are cute too.  So, as always, I went to google images ...there are a lot of cheesy cakes.  I decided on a bucket full of water with a few ducks inside.  This seemed like it would be a relatively easy cake.  And, quite honestly, it wasn't bad at all. 

A few days ahead of time I made the ducks (I prefer everything on my cakes to be edible) even though my husband recommended I just buy a few plastic ducks.  The large duck was made out of rice crispy treats covered in fondant.  The little guy is all fondant.  I also rolled and cut out the 'wooden boards'.  I colored my fondant tan first.  After each strip was cut I added some texture with some of my fondant and gumpaste tools.  Once it had a chance to dry a bit, I painted each with some gel food coloring/lemon extract.  Then let them dry a bit more.  I also made many little white balls to be used as bubbles.

I stacked to 8 x 3" round cakes with cardboard in between.  Covered it in blue frosting.  My husband helped hold up the 'wood' strips while I laid the gray strips around the entirety.  I had to double them up as the first layer kept cracking as the 'wood' strips didn't want to stay as tight against the cake as I wanted them to.  I laid the ducks into place.  I used royal icing to place the bubbles and then painted them with a little shimmer dust.

Adding the finishing touches.