My daughter is a huge Strawberry Shortcake fan, so it was no surprise when she requested this as the theme for her last birthday party.  Only problem is, unless you live in the United States, it is very hard to find party supplies with Strawberry Shortcake on them.

Instead I decided to make my own Strawberry Shortcake inspired decorations and I am super happy with the way they turned out.

Invitation

Pom Poms before

I went with a pink, lime green and white colour scheme and wanted to do something other than balloons and streamers.  My little girl is no longer a baby, this was her fifth birthday, so I thought it was time to do something a little more grown up. I absolutely love the look of these pom poms and they were super easy to make too.

Birthday Banner before

And what’s a party without a birthday banner. I even managed to find some images of Strawberry Shortcake online, to include on the banner. Love how this turned out.

Pom Poms and Birthday Banner after

Sign welcoming guests to the party

The details of the invitation had been about inviting everyone to the Berry Cafe, so had to have a sign.

Pin the stem on the Strawberry

There were eight kids at the party, all cousins (ages 8 months to 7 years), so I came up with a couple of activities to keep them entertained, including Pinning the Stem on the Strawberry.  Had the husband cut out a large strawberry from poster board and then just cut stems out of construction paper. Was a huge hit with the kids.

Loot bag stuff

We also had them do a colouring craft. I found flower pots at Michael’s that had a colouring page insert, so they had a great being creative and then had a nice keepsake to take home with them. I also included a pack of flower seeds, along with a book and colouring book in the loot bags. I, for one, am tired of the dollar store crap my kids bring home from parties, so I wanted to make sure the kids took something home that was actually useful.

Cake and candy

And no birthday is complete without cake. Again I used the same colours and designed the cake to represent new Strawberry Shortcake’s dress, with pink polka dots on the bottom and the diamond / strawberry pattern on top. My daughter loved it which is what it was all about.

It was a great party and I loved how everything came together and put a big smile on my daughter’s face.  Now if only I could deal with the fact that she is now 5!!!!

This fall has been such a whirlwind of activity that I have neglected my little space here on the internet.  I vow to change that but for now here is a sample of what I have been up to. I recently made these cupcakes with matching cake, for my niece’s Baptism.

Chocolate cupcakes with buttercream icing and candy molded chocolate cross

Two-tiered chocolate / vanilla cakes covered in buttercream with strawberry buttercream filing and fondant accents

These were so well received that I have been seriously contemplating starting my own cake business.  What do you think?  Would you buy any of these?

Now that Spring is here (and the rain!!) the busy birthday season has ended in our family.  Seems when we started having children, my sisters and I decided that all the grandchildren should be born in a three month span (years apart of course).  Starting in early January and ending near the end of March, we had 6 family birthday parties. Makes for a very busy but fun time, especially for me since I seem to be the family birthday cake maker, a hobby I love to do.

As a result, this poor blog of mine has been neglected.  I still haven’t figured out how to do it all and this other hobby of mine seems to be the first thing that gets shoved to the back burner.  But I did want to share some pics of the cakes that helped put smiles on my nieces, nephew and children’s (even my Dad) faces on their special day.

Optimus Prime and Bumblebee birthday cake

My nephew is a huge Transformer fan so I incorporated his two favourites, Optimus Prime and Bumblebee into his cake.  Turned out pretty well I think.

Next up was a Tinkerbell themed birthday cake for my daughter’s 4th birthday. Cake was decorated with buttercream icing with flower and butterfly accents.

Tinkerbell inspired birthday cake

March was a busy, busy month for birthdays.  We had 7 family birthdays, 4 of which required my services.

Strawberry Shortcake birthday cake

For my daughter’s “twin” (my niece who was born 8 days after my daughter), I was requested to come up with a Strawberry Shortcake cake.  Since I have yet to attempt to make figures myself, I relied on some plastic figures I  found at the toy store for the Strawberry Shortcake element. The cake was iced using buttercream icing with fondant accents.

Strawberry Shortcake Cake with figures

My Dad’s birthday was next and although his cake was simple, it was no less meaningful as he is a huge baseball fan.

Baseball birthday cake

Next up were cakes for my son and niece, who were born on the same day, one year apart. So far, planning their birthdays hasn’t become a logistical nightmare!

For my niece’s 6th birthday, she wanted a flowers and butterflies themed cake and this is what I came up with. Again I used buttercream icing and fondant accents. I’m not brave enough to cover the entire cake with fondant yet. Unfortunately, I had also created a flower and butterfly fondant spray which didn’t survive the trip to the party ;(

Flowers and Butterflies

We had a Star Wars Jedi Training party for my son’s 7th birthday (a post on the party details is in the works) and I decided to attempt a Death Star.  It’s not my best work, but my son loved it!

Star Wars Death Star birthday cake

Hope you enjoyed the pictures as much as I enjoyed creating the cakes.