The Big 1

We were finally able to have Hazel's 1st birthday party bash - hooray! (last week we had to cancel due to illness)

Hazel had a great time, as did the rest of the group. She, of course, didn't know what all the hullaballoo was about, but we sure had fun throwing her a party. She was very impressed with her candle, and all the kids helped her blow it out.

Hazel wasn't a bit shy about diving into her cupcake - why use hands when you can just do a face plant?

The aftermath. She looks a little uncomfortable about the results of face planting...

Some of my friends were teasing me about Hazel's cake, they said it looked like a wedding cake not a baby's cake....but I ask you, how many wedding cakes have paper flowers on sticks poking out of the top? :-) Actually, I admit it does look wedding-esque, but I knew I needed to make a big cake, and I thought I might as well put the giant cake pans I had used for my own wedding cake to good use. (No, I wouldn't recommend people make their own wedding cakes - I spent a large part of the day before my wedding decorating our huge cake, and it was a little too much stress - especially because I was also working with friends and family getting all the reception decorations set up in my dad's studio/gallery. We saved a bunch of money, but the whole weekend was a big blur. A fun blur, but a blur nonetheless!) Anyway, I digress....

The icing, by the way, was my old standby of CoolWhip with a little bit of vanilla yogurt folded in for stabilization. I used about 3 oz of yogurt per container of CoolWhip (and I used 3 containers of CoolWhip for this cake and cupcakes!). Note: do not mix the CoolWhip and yogurt together until just before spreading on the cake, as it becomes hard to deal with (grainy) if it sits too long before spreading on FROZEN cake. I mixed each container as I went along, not all at once in a big bowl. If the cake is frozen beforehand, the CoolWhip icing will stay in good shape for several hours at room temperature.

The magic of candlelight...

Since we were expecting a big crew for the party, and since I know kids can't resist cupcakes, I just had to make this tiered cupcake stand as well. For more info on how I did it and where I got the idea, look at the bottom of this post.

The bottom cake layer was a marbelized cake, which I accomplished by pouring the white cake batter in first, then dropping the chocolate cake batter into the white in dallops around the whole cake pan. Then I took a butter knife and gently swirled and twirled back and forth and in circular motions until I felt like the batters had been reasonably marbled. Take care not to mix it too much, or you'll just have milk chocolate cake!

...and now for the pictures of sweet baby Hazel...

I couldn't resist making another matching set for Hazel and Eliza. The darling fabric is from Sandi Henderson's Farmer's Market line. I absolutely adore the bright colors and happy motifs.

Our happy, smiley, bundle of joy. I know I've said this many a time, but we continue to feel so blessed to have Hazel in our lives - she is such a special little girl. Unless she's sick, teething, or tired, Hazel is always joyous and sunny, brightening our days with her infectious giggles, laughs, and funny expressions.

Happy birthday, Little Pumpkin Head. We love you!

This tiered stand is actually just 3 plates (from Ross) and some glassware from Walmart that I spray-painted white. The bottom piece is a sundae dish, and the two top ones are tea light holders.

Since I didn't want to deal with storing such a huge dish assembly, I didn't glue any of the pieces together, although you certainly could. I just took little bits of plasti-tack and gently pressed the pieces of the stack together.

I would recommend using plates with less slant than these, because I discovered that things like cupcakes don't fit very well on such a steep angle - they all leaned in toward the center and threatened to smear icing on the ribbons.

I got this great idea from Rachel's site, One Pretty Thing, which features crafts and projects from all over the place. She compiles a new list every weekday - it's an oasis of ideas! Unfortunately, I can't find the original idea on her site anymore (it was sometime in September, I think), so I don't know to whom to give credit. The original tiered idea used glass candlesticks, but I couldn't find any affordable ones that suited this project - so I opted for the dishes and painted them to coordinate with the plates.