Train Birthday cake

Micah decided he wanted a train birthday cake this year. Actually, he first wanted a Mickey Mouse cake but I worked hard to steer him away from that because it would involve so much black. After having black mouths, lips, and faces from the race car cake at Ethan's birthday, I wanted to limit the use of black! I had fun posting the stages of Ethan's birthday cake, so I thought I would do the same with Micah's. So, enjoy the construction of the red train cake!

I searched train cakes on the internet and decided I liked a 3D one, so I baked the cake in my loaf pans.

I used one loaf as the base to the train engine and cut 1/3 of the second loaf for the tall part of the engine. I used the top half of the remaining piece for a little dimesion and used two large marshmallows for the smoke stack. I then had the bottom of a loaf for a train car. If you understood all of that, you get a gold star. Check out the picture and you'll see what I'm trying to explain!

I decided that the train car looked rather silly, so I cut off the sides and piled them on top. I'm not sure why I didn't just cut it in half. Maybe because that would have been easier.

I put the crumb coating of frosting on next. This part did not go so well. I had frosting everywhere and used way too much trying to cover all surfaces. I used so much I had to make a second batch of frosting. Since I rarely think a cake has too much frosting, I really didn't mind how thick it was getting!

I set to work making the train red. My "brilliant" thought was to use a star tip and do those all over the cake. The following picture is during a break in which I was trying to keep my hand from cramping. I switched to using the black (I know, I was trying to avoid black, but I couldn't help it) and frosted the smoke stack and made windows.

Jason came and began offering his encouragement...and then snapped pictures for the "in process" stage of this post.

I may never cover a cake using the star tip ever again. A least until I forget how much my hand hurt from covering the cake with stars. So probably I'll do it again next year.

Just when my hand was sensing a break, I had to frost the train car. The cake almost didn't have a train car. Did I mention that I had a major hand cramp at this point?

Once I was done with the red, I decided the train needed a little more definition. Pretty much so you could tell it was a train and not a truck. Of course, I headed back to the black. I think someone needs to take my black food coloring away.

My hand cramp was totally worth it when Micah work up and saw the train cake. He loved it! I managed not to tackle him when he reached toward it and asked if he could drive it.

Finally, here's the birthday boy with his train cake, candles and all. He loved it when Dad, Mom, Ethan, and his grandparents all sang "Happy Birthday" to him. He thought he blew out all the candles, but he didn't realize a strong wind came from the direction of his older brother.

As an added bonus, the cake actually tasted good, too. Even though I had a black mouth.