I was asked by my daughter-in-law to make a cake for a baby shower she was hosting. This shower is for two moms-to-be. One is expecting twin girls and the other a baby boy, if I’m remembering right. I would need a lot of cake and something not gender specific.
Illustrator drawing of my idea for the diaper bag cake.
Wanting to try something different from anything I’d done so far, I thought every mother-to-be needs a diaper bag. Let’s go for that! Not sure how to go about doing it though. I’ll start by drawing out my idea on the computer and break it down from there.
I baked a large sheet cake that would get cut into thirds and stacked. That finished I could move on to the extras…
I’ll make the teddy bear out of chocolate cereal treats. I ended up making two sizes of bears. I’ll decide which one to use later. I tell myself its always good to have a backup anyway. I’ll use mini chocolate chips for the eyes and nose. It took toothpicks to keep the arms and legs on. Remember to mention that when the cake is picked up!
Detail of gum paste baby bottle and keys in the side pocket.
I went out to Toys R Us to buy a set of baby keys. I wanted to make actual sized items and couldn’t remember from the old days how big they were. When I got home, I drew key patterns on the computer, printed and cut them out. Since I like the brighter colors they have now, I colored gum paste to match. These would have to be made ahead so they could harden. Especially the ring they hang from. I found that laying the pattern on top of rolled out gum paste and cutting with a sharp blade gave me the basic shape. One thing I figured out was that they turned out too wide. I went back to the computer and cut down the pattern. That way I could use a rolled edge around the key and still keep the right proportions. Adding a pressed pattern to the key ,before cutting it out, gave me a texture I thought it needed. This diaper bag was all about patterns and texture.
Detail of flower appliques on quilted bag.
The flowers on the bag would be blue and pink, no favorites here. So, more gum paste coloring for me (I can really appreciate pastels here). I use two sizes of the basic rose cutter for the flower shapes. They will be easy to layer for dimension and I can add a circle of white to brighten the bag. I made plenty, not knowing exactly how many I wanted to use.
The next items I needed to make ahead were the bottle, pacifier, silver rings and booties. I made a regular recipe of cereal treats and set about shaping the bottle. I had a baby bottle from a previously held shower to look at. Why do they have to have all those angles on bottles! I learned that you have to keep in your head the fact that this is going to be covered in gum paste or fondant and has to be made smaller to accommodate that added layer. The nipple itself is deceptively hard, no need to make any of the many different shaped ones available today.
Front pocket with flower appliques and pacifier
I had enough gum paste left from the keys to make a pacifier. Settled on the color purple and used a simple flower cut-out. It seemed a little too plain, so I took a straw and cut holes into the petals for more interest. Another nipple and a ring of gum paste attached to the back of the flower made up the pacifier.
Sweet baby booties from gum paste… ribbon is only thing not edible on cake.
I had made a pair of booties for a previous cake and thought they would be good here too. This time, just plain white generic booties. I found my pattern and got the ribbon cut and ready  then went about making the booties. Rolling the gum paste thin and making a glue of gum paste and water, helps make these easy and quick drying. You just have to remember to put your ribbon through the holes before they dry. Less chance of breakage that way.
So now everything that has to be made ahead is and is set aside to dry. Yea!
I found I had a nice coated floral wrapping paper that would work with the colors I chose for the cake. I wrapped the cardboard base in that to add to the overall baby shower look.
Everything is cleaned up and waiting. Time to get a good rest and attempt the cake tomorrow.
Cake time! I defrosted the cake, cut and stacked the layers while still cold. After seeing the stacked layers though, I wanted it to be taller. Not having enough time to bake another cake, I made a base of cereal treats for the cake. I put dowels down through the layers into the treat bottom. It’s a taller cake than I’ve done before and I wanted it to stay upright. Dirty iced the cake and moved on to fondant.
Close-up of the end pocket and strap on the diaper bag cake.
I ended up rolling out a lot of green fondant! My first attempt did not work. I had tried to do the sides individually. Nope, not that way. Instead I went up one side, over the top and down the other side of the bag. Using a tool to make the stitching I “quilted” the bag and moved on to the ends. I rolled longer pieces for the ends and decided to have them fall over the top, just like fabric would do. I hoped that would keep it from falling off the cake. Seems to have worked, so I went ahead with my plan.
Fondant diapers, wash cloth and bib with treat teddy bear in diaper bag cake.
I used plain white fondant and folded some rectangles to resemble diapers. All I needed was enough to look like the tops of diapers to set “inside” the diaper bag and look like they went all the way down.
Darkening the green fondant I rolled a trim to go around the bag. After using a little fondant “glue” to keep it in place I started to make the pockets.
I knew I wanted a realistic look to this cake so that meant the pockets had to sag a little. How to keep it at a little, was still a mystery to me. I went ahead and rolled out the fondant and added blue stripes. Then I cut the pocket shapes. At this point I would put the end pockets on and see how they handled. So far, so good! I stuffed a little bit of plastic wrap in the pockets so they would stretch a little… please dry fast! Now for the larger front pocket. Same procedure only I wanted to make sure that more of the pocket was attached to the bag. More plastic wrap to make room for the pacifier and it was time to stitch around the pockets. Finished for the night. Details would wait until the next morning.
Luckily, I was exhausted after all that thinking and slept pretty good. Could have been worse… at least I didn’t have nightmares about waking up and seeing a fallen cake!
The next morning I found the cake all in one piece. It had settled some, but that just made it look more natural. I had planned it that way… right!  The top needed more than diapers, so I made a wash cloth of orange fondant and embossed a pattern with bugs and butterflies in it. I had more blue fondant so I went with a soft yellow for a bib and trimmed it in the blue. Both of these I laid over the top of the diaper bag. I would add the teddy bear last.
I attached my flowers and decided they needed something more. I’ll make some tiny silver balls for the flower centers and silver nail heads for the pocket corners. These would match the silver rings I made to attach the strap.
Tall chocolate baby shower cake… diaper bag with baby accessories.
The last thing to make is the strap. I rolled out the dark green fondant and used  a pizza cutter to make the straight cuts needed for the strap. After using my stitching tool along both edges, I cut two smaller pieces and attached the rings to the bag by folding over the tabs just made. The key to keeping this strap in place was to let the bag hold it up wherever possible. I threaded one end of the strap through an end ring and let the pocket hold it in place. Then I draped the strap along the back of the bag and the base, up to the other ring and folded it over securing it with “glue”.
I took the photos quickly and left the cake put together. That way I could show my daughter-in-law how to put it together once it got to where it was going.
Always the most nerve-wracking part of it all…waiting for the call that the cake made it in one piece and that everyone loved it.
Finally… I can rest now and eat some cake trimmings!
