I know it’s not the best, but I’m getting better at making my cakes look more professional.  I’ll be a pro in no time

I messed up on the fleur de lis twice before it came out decent.

The cake is a chocolate butter cake, buttercream icing, cream cheese filling.

Yay, Wallace! The cake looks great and the fleur de lys is very symmetrical, so I’d say your triple-take paid off!
The cake sounds delicious!  Is that chocolate butter cake awesome or what?

How did you make the fleur de lis?

I tried to pipe a line of fleur de lis once, down the center of a roulade, and just could not do it.  I practiced for a long time on a sheet pan, but in the end had to go with a row of shells. 

I agree, you’ll be a professional in no time.

Well, Julie I didn’t free hand the fleur de lis that’s for sure.  I can barely draw stick men correctly   In the first Wilton class they taught us how to place an imprint of an image onto a cake.  Basically, I just found a design I liked online, printed it out, traced the image onto some parchment paper, the flipped the parchment paper over and trace it again using piping gel on the other side, placed the piping gel side of the image on the cake, lightly brushed the traced lines of the image so the piping gel will adhere to the cake, and finally slowly remove parchment paper.  The same image you traced on the parchment paper should appear on your cake.  For the piping gel, use tip 1 or 3.

Wallace, your cake looks professional to me. It’s great!

Hi Wallace, your cake looks great!  And thanks for the decorating tips, too!

Wallace, your cake looks wonderful.  I love your Fleur de lis, it looks beautiful.  I think you did an amazing job for your first cake.  And just think,  they will only get better and better the more you do.

Wallace - i think the cake looks great!  I also took the Wilton classes - and i noticed that working with “real” butter cream instead of the Crisco butter cream they tell you to make - is so much easier to spread and there is no comparison in taste!  I am very picky over butter cream and the recipes that Rose has in her book (The cake bible) i think are practically the best.