I find it very difficult to move past a situation where I was at fault for a cake issue. I can deal with the customer service end of it.
But, personally, I am so disappointed in myself & start to feel like I'm not cut out for this. But I know everyone makes mistakes, no one is perfect. How do all of you move past this?
Feeling discouraged,
thanks
Hi,
Please tell us what happened and we can give you advice (if we can help in any way) 
feel better soon,
Jodi 
I know exactly how you feel.. I just had a cake like that 2 weeks ago and told myself I'm just not cut out for this and swore never to make another cake. I had been planning the cake for months, was so excited to make my first (now last) 4 tiered cake for a cheer banquet.
It was a disaster from the get go - too many distractions, tried to get too much done last minute and ended up lost and an hour and a half late with a lumpy cake. I was crushed. I had huge dreams for the cake and was so disappointed with it.
I still get sick to my stomach thinking about it.. That weekend I had 3 more orders for 2 tiered cakes and didn't want to back out last minute, so I did them. Planned them out to the minute and took a day off from work to do them - still got stressed out and told the kids not to let me say yes to any more cakes.
Did a simple 1 layer cake today for a friend and was in heaven again. I've learned not to bite off more than I can chew. Wish I could say I learned to manage my time better but I still do most of it last minute! You'll get your mojo back, maybe try a little cake for fun, to remind you how talented you are!
Thanks Sheer 1030, it helps to know I'm not alone!
Just not giving mother nature the credit she deserves. As in, too hot & melting buttercream.
I know I messed up & what I should have done differently.
I just have a hard time picking myself up after I made a mistake.
So, I guess just dust myself off & learn from my mistakes?
It's hard to remember that even big time professionals are not always perfect.
Just wondering what you all do when you feel this way.
Thanks!
From what I understand, there was only one PERFECT person.
It was .... um ...... you know .... that one guy? Give me a minute. Oh shoot!! What was his name? They made a movie about him?
oh yeah! JESUS CHRIST! 
And you know what? I ain't Him! 
Seriously, we all set high standards for ourselves and want our finished cakes to be awesome! But as the saying goes .... "stuff happens". We can try our darn-dest (is that a word?) but we mess up and stuff happens.
Life goes on. Next!!!
You don't accept it. You learn from it and try harder the next time so you overcome your imperfections. I've had lots of disasters and should have quit a long time ago but I can't bring myself to kick this obsession. I make a lot of the same mistakes over and over again but eventually get it right. My advice is to make an awesome cake to prove to yourself that you can do better. Now pick yourself up and get back to decorating.
No ones perfect and you can't please everyone. I always say I'll do better next time and learn from that bad experience. Don't be to hard on yourself. You learn from mistakes and it makes you a better decorator. Hang in there and you'll be fine.
Good Luck
I've learned to live by this.....it's not how good of a decorator I am, it's how good I can cover up my mistakes And the fact is that you are the only one who sees each and everything that goes wrong....other people looking at your cake don't see that.....as long as it tastes good, that's the only thing that matters in the end.. chin up
I do my best to figure out why it happened and correct it the next time. For example: I did a Michael Myer cake and the face had little dimension. When I had time to fool around with cake, I made it again- but only after I had thought about it long enough to have a pretty good idea how to improve it. Even if the second cake is just for learning purposes, it's worth it to me so that if I run across the same type of issue again, I will know how to do it. It's all part of the learning process for me.
My first topsy turvy was done in a rush and it was ugly. I mean u g l y. So ugly even a momma couldn't love it ugly. It had tons of problems. I sent it with my daughter one state away to a KKPsi convention. I figured, "they're college kids, it's cake, it'll be cool." They loved it, it haunted my dreams.
Instead of being something to share in the hotel room at night amongst just her chapter, they put it on their sale table because of some glitch where they couldn't sell anything that weekend (just take orders or something like that). They used free cake to lure people over. Oh my gawd! That butt ugly, cut funky, oddly decorated cake was in front of the whole convention!
They loved it just because it had their Greek letters on it and because it was free cake. One month later, I made a small one for home consumption to prove to myself I could do it; I just couldn't do it the first time. Live and learn!
I'm a big fan of Flylady and once upon a time she sent this out, the difference between excellence and perfection. I've always appreciated the thoughts and it seems appropriate to post it here:
Excellence is willing to be wrong.
Perfection is being right.
Excellence is risk.
Perfection is fear.
Excellence is powerful.
Perfection is anger and frustration.
Excellence is spontaneous.
Perfection is control.
Excellence is accepting.
Perfection is judgment.
Excellence is giving.
Perfection is taking.
Excellence is confidence.
Perfection is doubt.
Excellence is flowing.
Perfection is pressure.
Excellence is journey.
Perfection is destination.
One time I thought I made a cake that wasn't perfect, but then I checked and I was wrong. Weird coincidence... it was the first time I was ever wrong too.
LoL... i am SO kidding. One look at my cakes and you won't need me to tell you that.
If any of you are ever feeling bad about how your cake turned out, just come look at my gallery and you will INSTANTLY feel better!
Really though, as it was mentioned... when I come up disappointed in a cake I make, it does me good to step back, take a break, and then make a 'fun' cake just for me. Something I want to do. Then I become happy about how it turns out and it makes me want to take on another cake.
*Hugz*
I get like that all of the time. I see these perfect cakes and mine never live up to that. I think I could do it, but I get so tired and stressed that I just give in and say its good enough. Another thing I do is, take a picture of the finished cake, when i'm tired, and its not a good picture. Messy kitchen, stuff in the background, why do I do this. I'm learning.
OK...you've forced me to pull out the big guns. I didn't even post a pic of this cake in my gallery because I was soooo disappointed in it and thought it was a DISASTER. But, it's time.
Hello, my name is Vanessa, and I made a cake-tastrophe. Who wants to submit it to Cakewrecks?
The good news is that I made this for a friend who has asked me for at least a half dozen cakes since
Sherryp, I'll take that as a compliment lol
Sorry I didn't list Yoda's faults. The body and clothes were super-easy. Followed a tutorial here on CC, and it was lickity-split.
But when I got to his head...
I started out with RKT. It was too soft and kept sagging and losing it's shape. Then, I made the fondant and could NOT get the right color for nothing! He ended up being electric-green. So, I'm panicking about the head, my time is running out, and the RKT isn't cooperating. I fly to Michaels and get a stryro ball. Rush home and try to apply the fondant. I said, "try." Putting fondant on a ball is SO STINKING HARD FOR ME. So, the fondant is tearing all over the back, I'm patching it, it's not sticking to the styro, it's wrinkling like crazy...you name it, it went wrong. So I leave the head alone to work on the ears. Obviously, the proportion is wrong. His head wasn't done, so I just shot from the hip on the size. He looks like an angry, rabid green bat to me. So I return to the head, and its all downhill. His features are terrible, the fondant won't behave, yadda yadda.
When all was said and done, I wanted to use him for target practice rather than give him to his owner. Yoda definitely made me feel like an apprentice lol.
But I had to move on. I had another cake to do that weekend, no matter how bad I wanted to burn all my caking supplies. The earth didn't fall off it's axis, and I've gotten over it. Hey, I can even laugh about it now hahahaha!
Indydeb...you rock! That was the first thing that came to mind, but you put it so eloquently!!!!
But I have come to the relization that things always go wrong. In my business, there is a certain percentage of problems and/or mistakes. Thats just life. What is important is how you deal with things. Learn from them, take care of your customers and move on!
Sassy74: the only thing wrong with that cake is the name. It wanted to be Dobby, not Yoda. LOL
Sometimes you have to go with what the cake wants. Too bad customers don't understand that; but why would they?
Attached is what I call my Topsy Turvy Oopsie. After it left the house, I got on here and researched what I thought I had already researched. There were things I already knew were wrong as the cake was in progress but I was once again too stubborn to stop and correct before going any further.
Bad cake happens. My next topsy turvy was much better structurally, but the design was ugly (due only to my own skill and once again, not stopping to correct as I went along).
Shoot, I have a file simply labeled, "Ugly Cake."
Sassy I see nothing wrong with your cake. That is without a doubt the BEST green chihuahua cake I have ever seen in my life!
You know I'm teasing.
Let me tell you this. I have been a Star Wars kid and fan since the original came out on day after my 2nd birthday May 25th, 1977... and I would ABSOLUTELY LOVED to have been the recipient of that cake! You don't even know how cool I think it is.
I don't think you realize just how good it is. Look at it split screen with a picture of Yoda. You did great. 3D's are very very hard and I know the pain of the RKT. It is from the dark side!
Also, if you can't tell how much I love Start Wars... my username... Darthburn and my quote. So you have to believe me now. Great job!
I'll share another story with you, once I took a class with a big name in the biz and they told me that there are NO perfect cakes, no not one! The trick is that the "experts" know how to work around the flaws to make it work for them, not get them down. And how do they do that? Practice, practice, practice!
Ahahahaha...deep breath....hahahaha!
Darth, that's hilarious! A green chihuahua! I love it!
And thanks everyone for your kind words. But I know what the OP is saying...when you have a plan and a vision for a cake and the cake doesn't want to go there (GREAT way to put that, cheatize!), it's very disappointing. Again, we have to move on if we're going to get any better.
OP, I looked at your pix. You don't have many, but the ones I saw looked fine. The border you put on the top tier of that squared cake is really awesome, by the way. I know we don't always post the pix of the ones that don't live up to our expectations--GUILTY--but your pix show that you are capable of turning out a great product!
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