Making of the Train Cake- for Imaya!

I've had a request or two for a blog on the making of Caedon's choo choo train cake. I didn't take pictures as I went because I hadn't planned on blogging about it. But I have to say that it really is a very simple cake to make and I had so much fun doing it.

1. I baked the cakes in 5 meatloaf/bread pans. They turn out to be the perfect shape and size for the box cars. It's fun too because you can pick different cake flavors- we did confetti and vanilla for the engine, chocolate for the second and last box car and confetti again for the middle box car.
2. We bought a large Pine board at Home Depot and covered it with foil. Then we arranged the cakes on the board. With the 5th cake, we cut it in half and stacked it on top of another cake for the engine. (with frosting between the two layers)
3. Next I made a big batch of buttercream frosting and dyed it 4 different colors- one for each section of the train. The colors turned out so nice and bright, which I was happy about. With help from my hubby, we were able to make the frosting that usually looks pink from using red food coloring look more purply. We didn't think a pink box car would work out too well on a baby boy's cake, but thankfully it did look very purple. We frosted the train then decorated!
4. We used Oreo cookies for the wheels and skittles for the engine windows and to outline the top of each boxcar. Then we filled each boxcar with a different candy- red Jube Jubes, Mike n Ikes, and Chocolate Buds. It was David's idea to use black licorice for the train tracks and it looked great. He also came up with the smoke stack idea of using an icecream cone. We frosted it and decorated it with Mike n Ikes and stuck it on the front of the engine with more frosting. Then we used cotton candy for the "smoke".

It really turned out so cute and only took a few hours to make. So there you have it- the making of the cake!