Seattle Seahawks inspired birthday cake

My friend Stacy decided to throw her boyfriend a surprise 40th Birthday party! He's very Seattle oriented and very into the Seahawks so we scoured the Internet for ideas and came up with this:

I started out with three 8-inch chocolate cakes for the base and two 6 inch chocolate cakes for the 2nd tier. Next I did a buttercream crumb coat to get it ready to cover with the fondant.

I ran into a small issue with the fondant on the bottom tier that I didn't notice until after the fact.  It seemed you could see the shape of the layers/filling under the fondant.  After some thought I think I rolled the fondant too thin for that layer.  The last cake I made I barely had enough fondant to cover so I think I was overcompensating a little and in an effort to make sure the fondant would cover the cake I think I got it a little thin.  I noticed that I didn't have this issue with the top tier (it was rolled a little thicker) so I'll need to be more careful next time.

We did dark blue & neon green stripes on the bottom tier (Seahawks colors of course).

Then for the top tier I did "Happy Birthday Donti" out of fondant.  I used an exacto knife to cut out the letters.... much harder to do that than I was expecting.



Then on the sides & back of the top tier I did blue & green footballs.

I also did a blue fondant "4" and a green fondant "0" for the top of the cake, but they weren't hardened enough to put in the cake before Stacy picked it up (plus I wouldn't have wanted her to travel with them in the cake anyway... better to stick those in at the last minute).  So at this point the cake is travel ready... hopefully she's able to use the "40" cake topper pieces.  If so (and there's a picture) I will post that later.

So... lessons for this time around:

• Fondant pieces:  Yes, they can really take a LONG time to harden.  If you want them hardened in time for your event... make them a few days in advance or use an additive like gum paste in your fondant (I've heard it makes the fondant harden much more quickly
• Covering your cake:  Although it's important to have enough fondant to cover your cake... it's also important to roll it thick enough to be a really nice/smooth surface.. watch your thickness!!

So, hopefully next time the cake will turn out even better!!

And P.S. ..... Happy 40th Birthday Donti !!