I love to see the temple...

I'm going there someday... Those must be the only two lines of this children's song from church. So the theme this year for Stake Women's Conference was Joy and Happiness. What a better way to represent eternal happiness than the Temple?The ride to Hancock was a little harrowing. The unfortunate breaking incident described in the Graduation cake delivered the same morning did a number on the construction of the temple cake. It leaned a little, and the driveway to the church wasn't much of a help either.From the ends it looks a little better. I had to have help to carry it into the building. It had 10 pounds of fondant on it and 7 layers of cake - 2 strawberry, 2 chocolate, 2 yellow, and 1 white. Once on the table, I added the spires and fixed and nudged as best as I could.The cake stood 28 inches high (compared to 288 feet high on the actual temple), 24 inches long (240 feet), and 13 inches wide (136 feet). Essentially 1 inch of cake equalled 10 feet of temple. Here is a picture of Sister JaNae Barnes on the left and that's me on the right so you can see for scale. This cake was massive.The spires were carved from green floral Styrofoam from the top level of the cake to 2 inches below the tip of the gold spires. From there a tooth pick (4 smaller spires) or a bamboo skewer (end spires) supported the rest. The spires were then covered in gum paste and shaped for the tower and spire details. Then the upper-most portions were painted with a yellow wash and coated with gold pearl dust like I did when I originally formed the Angel Moroni.And I would be remiss if I didn't provide the obligatory cake carnage pictures of the aftermath.There were sisters who hovered and waited as layers were cut and served so they could get their favorite flavor further down in the cake.

My friend Amy had the camera for most of the carnage and decided to take a picture of me standing over it with a knife in one hand and icing-covered fingers on the other.

Some one asked me how I felt cutting into one of my creations. I replied that I was relieved that I didn't have to obsess over the lean any more. I'm glad I learned one lesson from the castle wedding cake. Moroni's trumpet broke during the trip up, but I had my trusty hot glue gun there to save the day. Lessons learned from this cake? 1. Always have someone on the trip with you. 2. Less cake, more foam, or at least better plan the construction so that there is less of a risk of leaning. 3. Once it is set up, put on blinders and quit fiddling with it. Anal retentiveness is sometimes a bad thing...