Birthday Cakes, Cards and Crafts

This week's Works for Me Wednesday features a birthday theme. I've never been particularly fond of making birthday cakes, but my most infamous confectionary catastrophe occurred on my second child's third birthday. I baked a cake from a mix in a 9X13, and leaving it in the pan, I frosted it with whipped cream and attempted to decorate it with colorful sprinkles. Bad idea. The cake absorbed much of the cream and the lid fell off of the sprinkle shaker, dumping the candy confetti unceremoniously in a heap. Thankfully my three year old did not have much aesthetic sense and was perfectly thrilled with the mess. Unfortunately for me, the cake is memorialized in full-color pictures. (No I will NOT scan one in and post it!) I wailed to my husband, "Why can't I buy the cake and make the card? I'm much better at cards!"

Fortunately, before my children grew old enough to catch on to their mother's incompetence, familyfun.com came to my rescue. I'm betting that many wfmw participants will post about this wonderful website with a cake finder to provide step-by-step instructions for truly easy-to-make cakes that are guaranteed cute, allowing any mom to become a member of the "Fun Mom Club."

Betty Crocker is another good source of easy recipes for birthday cakes. Here is a cake that I made from a Betty Crocker recipe:

I still would rather make a birthday card! Here is a goofy card that my husband and I made together for my oldest son for his eighth birthday:


On the front of the card, we wrote: "For your birthday, we wanted to invent a CAKE EATING MACHINE..." Inside: "but then we realized: That's Why We Have YOU!!" (I said it was goofy.) I put together a little collage below this of small scanned in pictures of my son with cake at each of his previous b-days.

Our family's most elaborate birthday party in the past was a "Flying Pony Party" (named by my daughter) which included a hobby horse craft:

When the kids arrived, they colored posterboard pony heads that I had drawn and cut out ahead of time. Two other moms and I, armed with glue guns, stuck googly eyes on the ponies, glued on each kid's choice of crinkle paper mane, and attached a stick to make homemade hobby horses. (The mane and stick were sandwiched between two posterboard pony heads.)




This concludes a very wordy Works For Me Wednesday post!