Do you have a photo of the cake she wants?
I pipe/decorate before stacking. Use thin icing for piping small thin lines scrolls/wavy. Stencilling can be tricky and time consuming too. If using royal for stencilling you need to let each section dry before continuing, if the stencil needs to overlap to be continuous.
If a large cake is going out Saturday, I bake, level, tort, fill, ice and cover in Fondant on Thurs. Friday I decorate and finish the cake. Saturday is photo and delivery day. I photograph all my cakes before they leave. Monday through Tues I make all icing, filling, ganache, ready the cake board, make sure I have all cake ingredients required. Wed I organise all cake ingredients that way baking day goes faster. Weighing measuring and figuring out cake ingredients can be a real time sucker so I do it all the day before. Then on baking day I just grab the ingredients and just focus on mixing and baking.
Hope that helps.
Teri, Ontario, Canada http://www.TeriLovesCake.ca
