Cowboy Hat 21st cake

by Mandy W
(Australia)

My first attempt at decorating

I made this for my niece for her 21st birthday!!!
We are huge country music fans and love Garth Brooks (which is what the G stands for)
I made a mud cake base and built the hat up on the inside with layers of mud cake and gnash which I made a stencil on tracing paper before I molded hat to make sure it was a perfect fit.
The hat itself is bakels plastic icing rolled out and molded over a full size plastic dress up cowboy hat which I then let set for a day. I covered the hat in cling wrap so it wouldn't stick to the icing.
I then added the ribbon, silver sugar balls around rim (no idea what they are called lol), the key and the G which I painted with silver edible paint and dusted the whole hat with a silver shimmer dusting powder.
When I constructed the hat to the cake I simply turned it upside down took the hat out of the icing mould and placed the mould over the iced mud cake.
When I did this the sides of the hat dropped a little and cracked which I patched up with a paste (glue) I made with a little water and left over icing, which made it look like a worn hat I think, and once the "glue" had set I re dusted the parts that were repaired. I placed tooth picks all along each side of hat and left it for the night to set and took the tooth picks out just before I bought it out to show everyone and it held up well!
The writing on the board is just candy letters I found at the supermarket.
All up it took me about 9 hours (kneading rolling molding baking etc)
But I am proud of my FIRST attempt at cake decorating!!!!!!!!!