Here is the situation.. my husband's grandparents are celebrating their 65th wedding anniversary and we are having a party for them. I volunteered to make a cake and table centerpieces. Damon's mom thought about 70-80 would come, now we have 115 RSVPs lol. So, I'm making a cake, cupcakes (don't think the cake will serve that many) and center pieces with fresh flower arrangements. The party is next Saturday, 2 hrs away, so we are traveling there fri night with all the stuff I'm making.

I have to time things correctly, since i can't make either cake or fresh flower arrangements too far ahead of time. I will likely make the flower arrangements on Thursday and finish off (roses) on Fri am. My question is, how far in advance could I make, fill and cover with fondant the cake?

Here is some info on the cake... pic:


The cake will be very similar to this one that I made for a baby shower-the colors and accents will be different, but structure, the same. The bottom tier will be chocolate cake with buttercream and hazelnut mousse, top tier will be golden butter cake with buttercream, cookies'n'cream and hazelnut mouse fillings. Then all is covered with Rhonda's ultimate MMF.

I know I can bake the actual cakes on Monday and let them sit out overnight and then put in the fridge, but what about buttercream and MMF?

For my sanity's sake, I would like to hear you say that yes, I could ice and cover the cake in MMF on Wed and stick it in the fridge and it'll all be good (party is Saturday MORNING, breakfast).. but I need to know for sure, don't want smth going bad or smb getting poisoned, you know....

If i could be done with the cake on Wed, life would be good. I'd do the flowers on Thur and then be able to do finishing touches on both flowers and cake on Friday before we leave..

I *AM* making all of the gum paste flowers, the board, the box top ahead of time...

thank you very much for ANY thoughts on this..... I'm a total newb and need any advice you can spare!

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Very nice work! This link may help you with timing and maybe freezing.

thank you for your response... I may experiment with freezing a fondant cake on my own time, but I'm very nervous about doing it this time. I made a cake once that had bcream and fondant that I did put in the freezer, and the condensation was crazy! Now, I didn't do it like the person in the other thread suggested-didn't put it in a box and wrap it tightly, and didn't do freezer-fridge-countertop transition, so that may very well have been the reason for a huge amount of condensation... so I will play around with her suggestions, just not this week. Too much at steak to introduce SUCH an unknown, when 115 people will see and eat my work on Saturday lol

I know I could make, fill and ice the cake, say, on Monday, and freeze it till Thursday and then cover it in fondant and decorate, but again, then I'm doing both that and 15 flower arrangements all on Thursday.... and that may have to be that way, but if I finished the cake on Wed, do you think things would hold ok in the fridge? As in, buttercream and other fillings won't go bad... We will have a 2 hour travel on Fri night, then the cake will go in the fridge again, and Sat am is the event..

My other slow-you-down factor are kids my 6 year old is in school all day, but I also have a 2.5 year old at home, and boy, is he an active helper. So even though I am already planning to get up before birds all next week to get as much done as possible before the boys wake up, I know that splitting things up as much as possible is wise, if I want to have any sanity left by Saturday (done it the other way, don't want to go there again)..