Just a long-awaited update....

Can you guess which cakes are which?

Howdy, visitors and cake enthusiasts! I'm sitting here on this day thinking, 'Has it really been 8 months since the cakes pretty much disbanded from their places?'. Technically it was a bit longer than that as some of them (those that were auctioned off) were taken away early and placed at the Media Commons by Nine Network. On January 1, 2015, it was a new year and a rough new beginning for cakers. Several people found themselves as the new owners of cakes and from that moment on, cakes started disappearing little by little from their places.

As of this writing, there are an estimated 85-90 cakes still placed (in public view) at their original locations. This does not include the ones that are displayed in Maplewood. That's less than 2/5ths of how many were put out. Most of them are in Missouri, but again not many. Same for Illinois. Really the only ones left are four on the 'Northern side' and at least a few in St. Clair County.

So what about the others?

-Storage  (some of the private owners decided to put them away for various reasons. One thing I do find very interesting is that the Daniel Boone and the Lindenwood cake are together in storage)

-Privately auctioned. After the biddingforgood.com auctions, a few of the places decided to hold their own.

-Given away. A few people were very fortunate to get their own cake for free. Not sure of the many reasons why, but I do trust that the people appreciate the cake for what it is and that they will take great care of it (or them). (As for me, I don't have the room for one! lol)

-Unknown. There are some places whose cakes have just disappeared like that and nobody knows what happened to them. This may also include the people that work for the former cake host. We're all very curious as to what happened to the Busch Stadium cake. I'm sure it will be a cold day in a hot place when we find out. As for me, I'm wondering what happened to the Meramec Caverns cake (since its so far and nobody wants to go out there again), as well as the Edward Jones Dome and the Convention Center cake. I'm speculating that those two are in storage together since the two buildings are linked.

-Repainted. In the last few months, we've seen at least five cakes get a new look. I understand some people are disgusted at this, especially if its not considered respectful in many ways. I say its fair and square if it was sold to the new owner(s), or if it is still owned by that cake-hosting place. Mark Swain re-painted his Centennial Greenway cake and made it into the Saturday Morning Cartoon cake. The Blue Owl recently re-painted their cake for their 30th anniversary celebration. It is said that Greenville, Illinois will be doing the same to mark their bi-centennial.

-Cakewalk display. The Cakelovers (which I am involved in) decided to display cakes around the Maplewood area. I'll explain more at the bottom.

-Destroyed and/or stolen. Yup, it did happen, unfortunately.

But again, the places that still have their cakes out. Many different reasons for that. I have talked to some of the places about what they were doing from there with their cake and not many knew. I remember taking a tour of the GRIOT Museum in the Spring and the lady who worked there said they were going to leave the cake out (to attract more visitors).

I have been busy with projects that have a lot to do with the cakes...more on that later on.

And lastly....please be sure to check out the 2015 Cake Status page (link to the right)! Check out where your favorite cakes are!

Where are they now?

The Cheshire cake on March 2, 2015

Hello, again! This is my first post on this blog of 2015, and I know I'm a bit overdue to make one so I thought I'd give everyone the scoop of what's happening while the cake hoopla continues to die down. I never thought I'd say such thing, but it's been over two months since the stl250 Cakeway to the West has ended. It's sad, but like they say, all good things have to come to an end. There are several memories that were had and many of us 'cakers' would love to do it again (myself included!).

On a good note, about a third of the cakes are still out at their original, or home location. Most of you know a lot of them were auctioned off from biddingforgood.com, as the proceeds went to improve the Chouteau memorial downtown. By the way, close to $50,000 was raised! About a few of the locations auctioned off their cake themselves, raising money for whatever cause (such as improvements of their place or whatnot). But some of have moved them indoors so patrons and visitors can continue to look at the cake masterpieces. At least a few are in talks of being re-painted by their places, most recently the one at St. Anthony's Medical Center.

But on a bad note, a few of the cakes had a sad ending. Two of them turned up missing/stolen, while at least one was taken to a recycling center. The good news is there are some caring people in the world who are working to preserve all of the cakes that are not just eye candy, but hours spent in hard work from the artists. Just recently, the cake at the Grand Avenue Water Tower was damaged from a snow plowing vehicle and it luckily was saved by a caker, who is repairing it at the moment.

To find out the current status on your favorite cake(s), please check out the new page I created. It is on the right hand side of this blog and the page is called '2015 Cake Status'. I will also be updating all of the cake pages on where the cake is now. It'll be time-consuming, but it will be worth it! You can also check out the website I have created called St. Louis 250 Cake Lovers, at www.stlouis250cakelovers.com. I have been very busy with the page that last three months, packing it with so much information! I hope you find both of these sites useful.

I'll post a few more pages in the coming weeks....stay tuned!