My niece Cassidy is one year old today. She is the daughter of my youngest brother David and his wife Stephanie. Cassidy is a beautiful little girl and this past year has truly been a joy.
The big birthday celebration was this past Saturday and the theme was Hello Kitty! I made the cake and cupcakes using a yellow cake recipe from from Cooking Light (via Tanvi) and an icing recipe from Gail Gand which I found on the Food Network website. I baked the cupcakes for 20 minutes and each batch made 17 cupcakes. The cake was cut from a 13 by 9 inch sheet.
All 34 cupcakes were decorated by Chuck, Bob, me, and one of Cassidy's cousins. We had a regular production line going! I was ready to call it quits after just half were decorated, since guests were starting to arrive, but we pushed on (especially Chuck). We used Wilton's gum paste, which is sort of like a sugar clay. I have never used fondant before, but judging from the recipe for uncooked fondant that I saw, I think it is very similar to this gum paste.
David and Stephanie purchased a cake for purposes of the picture above. We all watched and waited for her to make a mess of it, but Cassidy didn't quite get it. David finally pushed her hand into the cake to get things going. The icing wound up all over her face, but I think she did manage to get a little taste.
Happy birthday dear Cassidy!
16 comments:
I want a Hello Kitty Cake too plllleeeaaaassseee :)
I hope she had great birthday
Hi Cathy,
You all must have had so much fun decorating all those cakes. They are so cute! Wish your niece a Happy Birthday from me. =)
Wow, those are wonderful looking, Cathy! What a cute idea.
We couldn't get Alex to demolish his cake on his first birthday, either! And when he had his second first birthday (visiting my parents), his Grammy had a special cake for him, a goofy face with the words 'Smash Me' written on it.
He couldn't have been less interested.
I'm beginning to think all those photos of kids sticking their hands and face in cakes is just a publicity stunt!
The Hello! Kitty cakes are adorable.
I've used the Wilton stuff before...it's pretty nice.
Cho chweeet . the cupcakes look adorable :) Happy birthday to the little sweetie. Its a lucky kid who gets to have an aunt who bakes cookies every week !
Hi Clare - thanks, I think she did! I really think she enjoyed the party and today she went to the zoo with her parents.
Hi Reid - it was fun, though a little stressful because of the time constraints. Thanks so much!
Hi Nic - Thank you! David and Stephanie picked the theme quite a while back and we started talking about how to decorate the cupcakes back then. We were stumped on how to do the ears, but thankfully I came across this gum paste stuff!
Hi Stephanie - I love the idea of a "smash me" cake, though I guess the sentiment might be lost on a one or two year old! The gum paste was perfect for this sort of thing, but I couldn't bring myself to eat much of it. I wonder if you could swap a little flavoring (lemon or maybe vanilla) for some of the water?
Hi Nupur - thanks! She doesn't know about the cookies yet, but David and Stephanie have already told me they think it would be nice for her to make Christmas cookies with me when she gets older - I can't wait!
Oh my gosh! What a DARLING cake! It reminds me all of a sudden of another japanese cartoon character - a green frog, forgot what the name was. Lucky, lucky Cassidy for having such a great aunt!
BTW, thanks for your input on vets. I know it's really my fault for not thinking to find one BEFORE we got the dog! ;-)
Hi Rowena - thanks! Ooo, I'll have to find that frog - sounds like the kind of thing David would like.
I think my comment on vets was more of a rant than input - sorry about that! I'll bet finding a vet is the last thing on the minds of most prospective pet owners!
Cathy, the cake and cupcakes are adorable! What fun! And I think I know the frog that Rowena is thinking of...it's a really weird name. Kerokerokeropi. It's from Sanrio...the same name behind Hello Kitty. I hope I spelled it right, it's hard to be sure! :)
the cakes rock! so adorable
Hi Alice - thanks, and it was fun! Thanks for remembering the name of that frog. I think it is right, since I found a number of references to it and even a couple of pictures. I haven't found a good picture yet, but they give me an idea of what he looks like. Anyway, I'll have to keep my eye out for him!
Hi Babe - thanks so much!
Adorable! How sweet of you to make such special, special treats for the party. Those tiny treats are little handfuls of happy.
kawaiiii >.<
Linda and Santos - thanks!
these are so cute! my little cousins would love these :-)
Hi Tanvi - thanks for the recipe, it was perfect for this! My sister-in-law had requested "yellow cake" and I was afraid I was going to have to resort to a mix until I saw your post. I had the scraps from the cake cut up with strawberries - yum!
Post a Comment