Cakes on Parade

Decorating cakes is a skill I picked up from my mother. She always made us beautiful cakes in bright, fun colors for our birthdays. Some of my favorites were Rainbow Brite and the stand-up Care Bear - if I get super ambitious I'll find some old photos and insert them into this post at some point. When I was old enough, she would use a cup of extra cake batter to bake a small cake for me to decorate and give me her frosting bags when she was finished. Over the years I picked up most of her skills (I never really mastered the rose piping technique) and developed some new skills of my own. As my mom has been affected by arthritis and carpal tunnel in recent years I've taken over a lot of the family cake decorating. In fact, I'm pretty sure it was decided before he was even born that my nephew's first birthday cake would be made by his adoring Auntie M.

I thought it would be fun to showcase a few of my favorite cakes I've made recently culminating in my latest accomplishment - my little nephew's Jake and the Neverland Pirates 1st birthday cake!!