My friend Susan and her beau Carl are getting married this summer. They are going to elope to Reno for the ceremony, and then have a party in rural Wisconsin. They came up with the best disclaimer for the invite on a marriage like this; both partners married to others before, and of a certain age: We are trying to condense two households into one, so no presents….please.

I'm going to make the cake, and Susan is subcontracting for the rest of the food - a little from here, a little from there - she didn't want me to cater the whole thing, so I could have fun at the party too.

We had a cake tasting on Monday -- the photo shows almost all the cakes, under wraps:
I made 6 flavors -- White cake, Yellow cake, Cordon Rose banana cake, Spice cake, Chocolate cake and Carrot cake -- and said pick three.

The spice cake was almost everyone's fave. They're going to have the white cake with raspberry jam & chocolate filling on the bottom, then the spice, banana, and a tiny lemon poppy seed (the Cake Bible, source of the banana cake, has a good lemon poppy seed, too) on the top to freeze for next year.