Were you surprised by the winner? *spoilery*

Based on the entire season, I was surprised that Frances won. She never really seemed to shine and, as was repeatedly pointed out by Paul and Mary, she cared more about style than substance. She started doing better in the last couple of weeks but it was the very last challenge, the wedding cake, that won it for her. Ruby clearly won the picnic pie challenge and Kimberley did the best on the pretzels (Frances was the worst of the 3). After the Technical Challenge, even Paul and Mary said that Ruby had a slight edge over Frances and Kimberley.

The actual cake part of Kimberley's wedding cake looked delicious but her decorating was bad, especially that language stamp she used. A big flat stamp is going to come out messy on a round cake... why didn't she do a square tier for that part? She also overlapped that stamp and didn't take the time to line it up so it looked very unprofessional and smeared. Ruby's cake was lopsided and the colors made it look more like it was for a baby shower or a little girl's birthday party. Frances' cake was very pretty but I agreed with Mary that she should have wrapped the dried veggies all the way around the cake instead of just cascading them down the one side.

I don't know what I'm going to do this Sunday without another episode of this show to watch! I guess I'll have to wait until next fall for PBS to run another season.

If they were judging based on the entire competition, then Kimberly would probably be the winner, followed by Ruby. Since the winner is awarded based solely on the final competition, I was certain Frances would be named the winner.

The judges thought that Kimberley's cake tasted great, but was disappointing in appearance. The stamped letters were shockingly bad. As Dagr said, she should either have made a rectangular cake or bought a curved stamp. I liked the cushion-pillow top, but it was very drab looking overall.

Ruby's cake was probably the worst. Three different colors that didn't go together and little thought to the decoration. On top of it all the cake was dry. Even though she won the basket challenge, she had no chance.

Frances' s looked the best (even considering the one-sided confetti waterfall). And they praised the flavors. If we assume that her's and Kimberley's were close in taste, then the decoration put her over the top. And Kimberley's pretzel win was canceled out be her soggy-bottomed picnic basket. As soon as both judges said they had a clear winner in mind, it was obvious she had won.

If I were to bet earlier in the season, yes for Kimberly. But as Kimberly started to have troubles, that's when Frances picked it up.
I disagree with Mary on the decoration going all around. If it had been for a real wedding it would have depended on where the cake was going to be placed. If it were in the center of the room, then decorate all around(although it really comes down to the one ordering the cake). If it is to be placed against the wall, which out of the many I have done & seen they are, then you cascade the decoration the way Frances did. If Kimberly had been a little neater on her decoration, then I think she should have one. I do see where she was going with the "white" on the outside being how colorful the inside was, especially the 2nd tier.