A Tale of Two Easy & Fun Themed Birthday Cakes for Kids (Ultimate Recipe Swap)
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Birthday cakes are a big deal is these here parts. It’s been interesting to watch them evolve over the years. We’ve traveled the world with our family’s birthday cakes to Egypt to Rome to the beach to the golf disc course. We sung Happy Birthday with Bob, Dora, and Rapunzel. We’ve explored the deep blue sea as well as the Death Star. Heck! We’ve been to Infinity and Beyond.
So, it surprised me this last couple months that my kids were a little mellower with their birthday cake choices. They chose easy. Real easy. God bless them, they chose really, really easy. And I think you’re gonna like them because you could so pull this off — with ZERO cake decorating skill. Observe.
Easy Cake Decorating Technique #1: Let the Kid Do It
My nine year old awoke on his birthday in a tent in the mountains, camping with FishPapa and the other boys. They came home a day early in order to celebrate with me and the girls. Early also translates into “I didn’t know you were coming home, so I haven’t really done anything for your birthday.” But, I didn’t let on. I just set about baking a cake — from a mix — because that’s how I roll.
I made Homemade Buttercream with some cocoa tossed in for good measure and then said, “What would you like to put on your cake?”
Can I have a dragon cake?
“Absolutely,” says I, “go find the toys.”
FishBoy9 is all over the artist thing, so he searched about the house for the cake-appropriate Playmobil and decorated the cake himself.
That was easy.
He loved his cake — and he did a great job positioning the toys to look just right. I couldn’t have done better myself.
Easy Cake Decorating Technique #2:
Print out paper cake toppers
Now the next technique takes a little more effort on the parent’s part, but not much. When FishBoy7 had his birthday in May he specifically requested paper cake toppers in the shape of his favorite video game characters, Sonic the Hedgehog and Company. Experience tells us that there is no way in the world that we will find Sonic character toys to put on the cake, so we search the internet instead and print out three dudes in color on cardstock.
Obviously, you can do this with whatever characters your kid is interested in. Simply cut the shapes out and tape them to toothpicks, thusly,
He really is happy, he just doesn’t know quite how to act naturally in front of the camera.
Then stick your paper guys in the cake. Don’t forget the number candle!
Both these cakes were incredibly easy. I can’t tell you how easy.
I used a cake mix and homemade frosting, but you could certainly use canned frosting as well. You could do even make both these kind of cakes with store-bought cakes.
My kids were as happy as could be. I didn’t have to jump hoops — and they were completely satisfied.
Now, that‘s a happy birthday!
Got a great cake?
LOL! My 4.5 yr old is wanting a Jessie and Bulls-Eye Cake for her 5th Birthday in September. She looooves Jessie, and I think when it comes to making this cake I’m just gonna have to give in and bake a regular cake and stick her Jessie and Bulls-eye on top of the cake to decorate! Anything else is going to be too complicated! Love the Dragon cake! Adorable that he did that all on his own! Just need some candy rocks!
My youngest just turned 5 and I made him a robot coke. It wasn’t exactly perfect in my eyes (I am a perfectionist and cake decorating is not my forte!), but he LOVED it. Sometimes it’s about throwing perfectionism out the door and just making kids happy—they don’t care about how perfectly it was iced! http://justamom–refinedbygrace.blogspot.com/2011/06/one-whole-hand-old-bradlee.html
I just read that today is Sonic The Hedgehog’s 20th birthday. Doesn’t that make you feel really old?
Hello everyone!
I thought to share a recipe for the kind of log cake my mom used to bake me when I was a child and which was decorated differently each year.
A couple of weeks ago, we baked it for my grandparent’s birthday and I went with a simple but cute berry theme 🙂
Looking forward to trying out many of the recipes I saw in the links, they sound good!
Thank you Jessica, for hosting this recipe swap 🙂
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.597734763353.2100119.77201307#!/photo.php?fbid=597735960953&set=a.597734763353.2100119.77201307&type=1&theater
I made a “How to Train Your Dragon” icecream cake for my son’s birthday this year. He loved it and we all loved the icecream cake! Tastier and sooooo much cheaper than Dairy Queen!
I shared a duckie cake I made for my youngest son’s birthday last year. People still talk about the cake, including my now 3 year old.
I ran across a cool idea for Legos this week that would work for a cake decoration. Hole punch paint chips, cut them into shapes, and attach them to the Legos: http://www.filthwizardry.com/2009/12/lego-and-hole-punching-card.html
These are such fast and fun suggestions! Thanks.
I enjoy making cakes for my daughters’ birthdays. Last year I made a horse cake and a panda bear cake. This year my 3 year old wanted Backyardigans… and not just one, but all 5. It took me at least 4 hours to decorate it. A bit time consuming so for her party cake I’ll just be making thier faces. 🙂 My soon to be 7 year old wants more of monogram style cake w/ roses this year. I’m excited to see how elegant it turns out!
My husband actually requested my rice Krispie scotcheroos in cake form for his birthday next year — they’re versatile, easy, and delicious!
Love the cake decorating tips. I’m not very artistically inclined so I’ll take all the help I can get.