A Rainbow First Birthday Party

I was very excited at the prospect of organising Dylan's first birthday.  I had seen pictures of rainbow cake and despite never having made a cake by myself before, I decided to base the party around this theme.

Armed with rainbow bunting, multicoloured plates and bowls and plenty of balloons, I set about decorating for our rainbow extravaganza.  I made some birthday bunting using 13 pieces of coloured card and sticking a photo of Dylan from each month on them.  I pegged them to a piece of string and made my very own memory bunting following Dylan from a tiny newborn to a mischievous one year old.

We had all the usual party food and for desert I decided on plenty of fruit as well as cakes so the little people could have a healthy lunch.  As well as plates of watermelon and assorted fruit I made a fruit rainbow using strawberries, slices of orange, melon, green and purple grapes.

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How to make a Rainbow Cake

Rainbow cake is perfect for a baby or child's birthday, is fun to make and eat and not even too difficult! Six/seven layers of sponge in every colour of the rainbow and a great suprise once you cut into it!  A rainbow theme makes a perfect first birthday idea for a little boy or girl.

For Dylan's first birthday I had some very ambitious plans.  Having never made a cake before by myself, I set the goal of a six layer rainbow cake to go with the rainbow theme I was planning.  Here are a few things I learnt:

-Always make a practice layer.   It helps make sure the mix is right and that the colour comes out how you want it.

-Liquid food colouring will not cut it.  The paste is fantastic though and goes a long long way (I would recommend Sugarflair).

-Icing a 6 layer cake is not the easiest part!

-Don't be afraid to ask for help.  I tweeted and had so much advice and recipes and found this one particularly helpful 

So here is my recipe for rainbow cake.

16oz/450g butter

28oz/800g

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Silent Sunday

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You Make me Smile - week 3

We are on to the third week now of you make me smile, and I am looking forward to seeing some lovely pictures from you all.  Thanks so much for those of you that joined in last week, I loved seeing what you have been up to.  I would love for you to join in again, just grab the badge at the bottom and link up!  Remember it is 3 photos of things that have made you smile during the last week no matter how big or small. So without further ado, here are the things that made me smile this week;

Dylan turned eleven months yesterday and I have started planning the all important first birthday party!  We are going for a rainbow theme, with rainbow cake and bunting and very colourful decorations.  I have the plates, cutlery and bunting all sorted now!

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