Cake Nativity

Made this cake for the children's church's Birthday Party for Jesus. The idea was borrowed from a poster on CakeCentral.com, so I take no credit for the multi-leveled design, especially having the top tier as a starry sky. The human figures, stars and the cow are all hand-crafted from rolled fondant, which took four eight-hour nights to create (dying fondant is a long, laborious process), and the cakes are all iced in chocolate and vanilla buttercream. The dirt path is crushed Nilla wafers, the stable and manger are made from giant pretzel sticks, the straw is dyed coconut shavings, and the sheep are rolled fondant bases with buttercream "wool."

I'm pretty happy with how it came out, but if I could do it all over again, I'd definitely change a few things. The "sky" and winding path carvings didn't come out exactly as I'd have liked, and, if I hadn't been trying desperately not to make too much cake, I'd have done a 12", 10", and 8", instead of the 10", 8", and 6" I did, because the bottom tier looks crowded, and I'd have liked the stable to be a bit more roomy. I'd also be a little less concerned with taste (since it'd no longer be feeding picky little children), and use my regular buttercream icing recipe, which I usually find too sweet, but it much easier to work with.