2 cakes in 1 weekend

I made some cakes for a brother/sister birthday party this weekend.  It's A LOT of work to get two done by the same deadline!  I had to literally pull an all-nighter to get them finished in time.  Thank goodness for a mom who came and watched kids so I could sleep the next day!

 The boy wanted a lego stormtrooper.  It turned out to be as big as a small child becuase they had a lot of people coming to the party. I made chocolate cake with caramel buttercream.  The head is formed from rice krispie treats.

Here's the Hello Kitty cake I made for the little girl.  I formed the kitty with a mixture of fondant and gum paste.  Fondant alone is too soft, and gumpaste alone was too hard for me to get really smooth, so the combo worked great.

The top layer is pink cherry cake with cherry buttercream, and the bottom is white cake with chocolate buttercream.

This time around, I got a cake leveler and a new rolling pin.  The right tools make the process so much easier.  I also made the MMF(marshmallow fondant) in my Bosch mixer, which was better than doing it by hand, and it turned out really smooth.  I rolled the fondant thicker than I have in the past, which also made a more smooth surface with less bubbling/sagging issues.  I'm learning as I go!  I feel like I've run a cake marathon, but I think the family was happy with the results.