Free The Busy Girls Guide to Cake Decorating by Ruth Clemens

cake.”
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    8 Continue creating the elements and expanding the design until the cake is completely covered. There are two strips of lace going across the top of the cake and one curved section on either side.

    9 To finish off the edge of each strip of lace, cut several large fluted circles and cut out the inners with a straight-edged cutter leaving a thin fluted circle. Cut open the circles and form into straight lines. Secure in place along each strip of lace on the cake using as many as required and trimming them where the cake meets the board.
    10 Trim around the base of the cake and the edge of the board with cream ribbon, securing with pearl-headed pins.

Pink Whisk
Making a statement piece
    Inspiration for cakes comes from all sorts of different places, this two-tier lovely is based on the design of my own website – I even have an apron to match!

Get it together…
    Round cakes: 20cm (8in) and 28cm (11in), both prepared for covering
    33cm (13in) round cake board
    20cm (8in) round cake card
    Four plastic cake dowels
    Sugarpaste: pale blue, white, pale pink and deep pink
    Round cutters: 2cm ( 3 ⁄ 4 in) and 5cm (2in)
    Buttercream or royal icing
    Pizza cutter
    Fluted pastry roller
    12mm ( 1 ⁄ 2 in) wide white ribbon
    Pearl-headed pins
    Basic equipment (see Equipment )
    1 Roll out the white sugarpaste to a 3mm ( 1 ⁄ 8 in) thickness and use to cover the 33cm (13in) board (see Covering a board with sugarpaste ).
    2 Set the 20cm (8in) cake on the 20cm (8in) cake card, securing with a little buttercream. Roll out the pale blue sugarpaste to a 5mm ( 3 ⁄ 16 in) thickness and use to cover the cake and board together, trimming the excess neatly and polishing with an icing smoother (see Covering a cake with sugarpaste ).
    3 Roll out the pale pink sugarpaste to a 5mm ( 3 ⁄ 16 in) thickness and use to cover the 28cm (11in) cake in the same way.
    4 Roll out some more white sugarpaste to a 3mm ( 1 ⁄ 8 in) thickness. Using the 2cm ( 3 ⁄ 4 in) round cutter, cut out 48 circles. Allow them to firm up slightly before using to create the polka-dot pattern on the blue cake. Secure each dot with a little water brushed onto the back.
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TIP
    Leaving the cut-out circles in position on your work surface for a couple of minutes will allow them to harden slightly so that when you lift them into position they shouldn’t pull out of shape.
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    5 Set the two covered cakes and board to one side and allow to dry out and firm up for a couple of hours.
    6 Secure the larger cake to the centre of the covered board using a little buttercream or royal icing.
    7 Take a length of greaseproof (wax) paper the same size as the circumference of the largest cake. Fold exactly in half, then into quarters, into eighths and finally into sixteenths. Unfold and place the piece around the outside of the cake. Use a pin to prick the sugarpaste through the paper in each fold position. This splits the cake evenly into sixteenths and marks exactly where the stripes should go.

    8 Roll out the deep pink sugarpaste into a long thin rectangle approximately 2–3mm ( 1 ⁄ 16 – 1 ⁄ 8 in) thick. Using the pizza cutter create 2cm ( 3 ⁄ 4 in) wide strips. Trim the strips to 13cm (5in) long each. You will need 16 strips in total but it is wise to work with just four at a time, otherwise the sugarpaste dries out too quickly and your strips will crack.

    9 Using the fluted pastry roller, mark stitching lines along the edges of the strips, approximately 3mm ( 1 ⁄ 8 in) in from the edge.
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    “Press lightly with the fluted pastry roller – it is only to indent the pattern, if you’re not careful it will cut through the sugarpaste and you’ll have to start all over again.”
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    10 Apply a scant stripe of water up the side of the cake and onto the top in the positions marked by the pinpricks. Secure each strip in place. Continue working around the cake until you have completed the striping.

    11 To create the strip of ribbon around the base of the