Y'all...I made a wedding cake!

My dear professor/friend just got married and I boldly volunteered to make her cake. The whole thing was very low-key - in fact they got married over a month ago, but had their reception/party yesterday. Yesterday - one week after graduation day. I figured...I have a free week, I would LOVE to make a wedding cake. And I did love it. But wow. It is a. lot. of. work! I'm going to publish several posts with pictures, as I can't seem to easily get them all into one!

Wedding cake!

I started on Wednesday with David Lebovitz' lemon curd.

A mere fraction of the eggs used. I bought 8 boxes of butter for this - 8!

One of the 3 double recipes of Wilton's lemon cake

heating core?! my proudest moment

I discovered something while researching cake making...

if you bake a cake that is really deep or over 10 inches wide, you need a "heating core". This helps the cake cook all the way through, because hate radiates out from the center and in from the edges of the pan.

I did not have a heating core, but I McGuyvered it with a (very thoroughly washed and lined with parchment paper) tomato paste can. Worked like a charm!

Decor

A made these ADORABLE cake topper clothespin dolls thanks to a tutorial from goingsewcrazy

The gum paste flowers were loosely (or not so loosely) based on the flowers from this cake featured in RealSimple.

..which had no tutorial so I had to figure them out myself. I opted for egg cartons, cupcake tins and ramekins. Worked out pretty well. I was happier with them before I tried to paint them though...

Crumby

I had to fill them before I could crumb coat them...

and before you can fill them you have to make an icing dam...so the filling doesn't go everywhere!

Three little crumb coated cakes. yay!

Process

Icing the 9 inch layer...

Putting them together - SCARY

Oh, and, I had leftover cake...so I made cake balls (thanks Bakerella)! I think these may have been a bigger hit than the cake to be honest! They were very tasty.

Finished product

I loved the topper...

...but sort of hated the flowers...

...as long as they're happy - I'm good.