"Watercolor" Owls

 My inspiration for this cake was Lauren Alexander's watercolor paintings.  This cake went a long with the onesie cookies.  The mother-to-be had made an etsy wish list of items she wanted for the baby and for the baby's nursery.  One of the items she had on her wish list were Alexander's "Triple Threat Set of 3 Owl Prints".  I loved the colors!  I wanted this cake to have a bit of artistic flair, so rather than using a standard sized cake I made a really tall cake and then cut the top at an angle.  I used five 6" round cakes and split each in half to fill with chocolate ganache.  It stood over a foot high.

If you look closely, you'll notice that the munchkin in the back is smiling - she thinks I am taking a picture of her :)

Then I frosted the tower of cake with more chocolate ganache.

Then covered it with fondant - this was not a pretty process.  The final product turned out just fine.  I need to find a better way to cover a cylinder cake with fondant though.

I then sponge painted blue and purple (using color dust and vodka) on my clean canvas.  This gave me blue fingers.

My husband knows that I am not taking his picture - but he thinks it's funny to sneak in anyway.

I then began to paint my tree (again using color dust and vodka), which was on a separate piece of fondant.  I wanted the tree and owls to literally pop off the cake - so I made them on separate layers.

See the blue fingers?

This time we were taking her picture - isn't she cute!

I applied the tree to the cake using some royal icing.  Then I began adding the owls (which were another layer).  I attached the owls with royal icing as well.  I also added a strip of white along the bottom to serve as a taped off border - like the print.

I added in some details with royal icing and more painting.  I also added another border along the top.

This was my final cake.  I was pretty happy with the overall look.  I wish that I had made the background a little bit lighter.  I have to remind myself to take a step back from time to time as I'm working to see what I am making.  I have a tendency to get in this zone and just keep plugging away. 

I do love the little owls though :)

Grace quickly grabbed her camera.  I think she has seen us do this a time or two.