Mom's Birthday Part II

Since there's no way we can eat after such gourmet lunch feast, we decided keep the dinner very simple, just some rice and pickles...and of course, the birthday cake.
I had baked the vanilla chiffon cake the night before, and it was time for assembly. I sliced up some organic strawberries, and started whipping the organic whipping cream. Then something happened. As I was whipping the cream, I noticed that it wasn't really whipping--it wouldn't thicken at all. So I increased the speed on the hand mixer. Finally, it started to thicken--in clumps. Somehow, the cream turned into butter without turning into the whipped cream first, as if though it had skipped that middle stage. So the cream got that very overwhipped look to it...

Notice the funky, curdled look on the cream frosting. It tasted OK...but the texture was off.

But the show must go on. We lit the candles, sang happy birthday, and had the cake. It tasted fine, but definitely wasn't as good as the one I made during our San Diego trip.
Honestly, I'm not sure what was wrong with the cream. It wasn't old, and I thought I was carefully watching it as I whipped, to prevent overwhipping. The only thing I can think of that I did differently was that I used powdered sugar instead of granulated. But that's textbook recipe, so it should have been fine.
But I felt kinda bad for Mom, using a poorly-whipped cream for her birthday cake. So I decided to redeem myself and the cake by redoing the cream. We got another carton of cream, and this time, I whipped it with granulated sugar. Lo and behold, it thickened in a timely manner, and turned into a lovely mound of creme chantilly.
After I removed the strawberries, I scraped off the clotted frosting off the cake, and smoothed on the freshly whipped cream.

...And added some more berries and white pearl dragees. Notice the smooth, soft texture of the cream. This is how a properly whipped cream should look. It also tasted a lot better, and Mom was happy. But we still had half of an entire cake left, so we invited Mrs. M, Hugh, and Sophie over for tea and cakes. They wolfed it down no problem. So note to self: unless absolutely necessary, don't use powdered sugar to whip the cream.