Baby Einstein Cake

My baby girl turned one on Tuesday. We celebrated a day early since Hubby had school and work all day on her actual birthday. I had a TOUGH time this year trying to decide how to decorate her cake. I could not make a decision to save my life and once I made a decision, I would change my mind. I couldn't keep track in my head what I was doing.

I kept searching online for ideas and had some of my own but they just didn't seem right to me. Can I just mention something here? Oh, yeah, I can, this is my blog. :) Some people out there...well they are spending way toooo much on baby's first birthday party. OH MY WORD! When you out-do yourself for the first birthday how in the heckfire (got that from Kayla Aimee) are you going to pay for the wedding? Come on, really? I feel bad for spending what I did and it surely was not much. I just was in awe of some of the party ideas and pictures floating on the world wide web.

I spent like one millioneth of what others might spend and we had a sweet time with preicous memories made. That really is what is important, isn't it. I would so love to link up some of those parties I saw, but I'm not the mean spirited or judgemental type so I won't.

So back to me trying to make a decision. FINALLY it hit me...the Baby Einstein caterpillar. We have a Baby Einstein dvd, Baby's First Signs that she loves. This 20 minute movie has saved my butt so many times during trying moments with my sweet little ornery girl. I can plop her in the Baby Einstein exersaucer that my beloved sister-in-law is letting us borrow, click on the movie, and say, "Do you want to watch the caterpillar?" She smiles, she giggles, she's content! Thank you caterpillar! And to show my gratitude to you, I honored you by decorating you on her first birthday cake.

He was so easy to make. It would have gone so much faster IF I had a couple more star tips and frosting bags. I had to stop a bunch of times to wash my one tip and bag and refill with another color. I wanted to put some purple on here but I had to add so much food coloring to the frosting to get the color bright, that when I added some red to my blue frosting, it looked horrible. Like pukey purple, so no purple! And there is a reason why the number one is in M&M's. I totally screwed up the frosting one, so I scraped and plopped on red M&M's!

I made a small "smash" cake for her to eat.


I used a dark chocolate cake mix because, frankly I think box cake mixes turn out so much better than homemade. I did make homemade Buttercream Frosting though. (I did not use clear vanilla like the recipe calls for and my white turned out fine.) YUM!

If you have never decorated a cake, it really isn't awful and hard. You can do almost anything with that star tip. It's crazy. I know the rage is fondant these days and I would like to give that a try some time, but that little star tips invokes so much nostalgia to me as I remember my mom piping out gorgeous cakes for loved ones so many times. She was super talented at cake decorating. I have just a fraction of that talent but am thankful that I have a fraction so my little girls can get Mommy-made birthday cakes each year filled with love.

I sure hope I never end up on Cake Wrecks, though. Yikes! ;)

Happy Birthday, Pumpkin!