Handcrafted Sugar Flowers (with Jacqueline Butler)

I wanted to share with you all, a class I recently took...  Now, I believe I've said many times over that I am self taught at cake decorating... but, I will be the first to say that I still have so much to learn.  The fact that I have not taken any cake decorating classes yet is not so much that I don't WANT to take classes, it's that the instructors I am interested in learning from never seem to make it up my way.  I'm not sure that I would get much out of a Wilton class at my local craft store.. and even my semi-local cake supply store only offers the most basic classes.  But, I would love to learn from some of the masters!

Enter... Craftsy!  They offer online crafting courses (okay, I think that was at least partially implied by the name, haha!).  At this point they only have one cake decorating/gumpaste flower class, but hopefully it will be popular enough that they will produce more in the near future.  The class that they offer (and that I recently enrolled in and completed), is called Handcrafted Sugar Flowers and it is instructed by Jacqueline Butler!

Jacqueline, if you don't already know... is internationally known for her stunning sugar flower arrangements.  She often travels to teach her techniques, but unfortunately has only once, that I know of, made it to my area... and I didn't find out about it until a week later!!  She writes The Petalsweet Blog.  Head on over to check out her amazing work, she is one of my favorite sugar artists!

Last month, I received, in my inbox, an ad with a discount offer for the Handcrafted Sugar Flowers class (regular price is still a great deal at $59.99), so I said why not?  It's a great deal and I've been looking to take some sort of formal instruction for a while now.  This class teaches Hydrangea Petals, Buds and Leaves as well as some Filler Flowers, Buds and Leaves.  While they may seem simple, sometimes it's the simple things that are the most difficult to learn/do.  For instance, I bought the new Wilton cutter set a while ago... and while I know they cutters aren't the greatest, I was hoping to at least make some half-way decent hydrangea!  I couldn't figure out how to get the tiny little center to stay attached, it got so slippery with glue!  Well, I don't want to infringe on Jacqueline or Craftsy by mentioning about her techniques... but she teaches some basic skills that will be useful when making sugar flowers, things I never would have thought about myself!

This class definitely gets my stamp of approval!  If you are, like me, mostly self taught, I recommend trying this class!  It's interactive, so you can ask Jacqueline questions and she can respond.  It's very informative and will have you mastering these basic flowers in no time!  OK, so I know that I have not yet mastered them... but my technique has already improved and I'm confident that with a little more practice, I will master them in no time!

I hope that my flowers do this class justice!  I have not yet received my order for the cutters and veiners... so I had to make due with the Wilton ones I had!  If you want to try this with the Wilton Hydrangea cutter... I suggest cutting the petals a little to give them more separation and a little more realistic look!

Sign up at Craftsy!

Happy Caking :)