It has been another interesting week! We spent at least the first half of the week still working on feeling better. I’m so glad that we were all better by Friday, so we could finally have my daughter’s birthday party. It was just a simple family party, but it was still important for my daughter to get to enjoy. Hopefully all the sick bugs stay away from us for a while, so we can get back to working on school this next week. For now, lets talk about how I finished up my daughter’s dinosaur cake! You can find Part One of this post at https://homelovedmama.com/fun-dinosaur-themed-birthday-party-cake-part-one/.

Buttercream Frosting

First, I took the cake layers out of the freezer, and let them thaw while I made the buttercream frosting. I ended up using the vanilla buttercream recipe that came with the recipe for the layers of cake. It is a very simple recipe that tastes great! Also, it ended up being the perfect amount for decorating this two layer cake. One think I did do, to make the frosting look a little more white, I put a very small dash of violet food coloring in. Then I mixed it up with my kitchen-aid mixer. This will look nicer for the clouds and sky. You can find the recipe at the Pinterest link below.

Stacking the Cake

To begin assembling the cake, I started by cutting the rounded tops off of the two layers. I like to use a serrated bread knife for this step. Just try to keep the top as level as you can. Even if it doesn’t turn out level like you want it too, the buttercream will fix a lot of the level issues. Now you have a thin slice of cake for you and your children to snack on while decorating!

Next, I put my first cake layer on top of an 8-inch cardboard cake round on my cake turntable. Normally I would do a 10-inch, but this is all I had, so I made it work. Then I put a dollop of buttercream on top of the first layer. I then leveled it out with my offset spatula, and added some sprinkles to top it off.

Now that the bottom layer is frosted, I took the second layer of cake and flipped it over. It is nice to have the sharp edges of the bottom of the cake layer to have at the top of your cake. Those nice edges will help make smoothing out the frosting easier. The flat top will also help make the top of the cake more level.

Crumb Coat

Now that the cake layers are stacked, it is time to seal in all the cake crumbs with a crumb coat. I put a large dollop of buttercream frosting on top of the cake. Then, with the offset spatula, I smoothed out the top, and started working the excess buttercream down the sides of the cake. I added buttercream where needed. This step does not need to be perfect. It just needs to seal in the cake itself, so that crumbs aren’t getting into the frosting that you will see once it is finished. Once it is nice and coated, and somewhat smoothed out, set the cake in the refrigerator to harden that crumb coat layer.

Cake Colors

Now it is time to start decorating the dinosaur cake! While the cake is cooling in the refrigerator, I separated the buttercream frosting into three bowls. I did leave some white buttercream in the large mixing bowl, so I would have some white for adding clouds at the very end of decorating. For this cake I needed brown for tree trunks, green for leaves and grass, and blue for the sky. I added food coloring to each bowl and mixed the buttercream until it was the colors I wanted.

Sky Technique

Now we can start decorating. The crumb coat should be cooled enough to begin adding buttercream over it. I started by adding some white frosting to the top and sides of the cake. Once I thought there was enough, I smoothed it out with my cake scraper. To add the blue, I took my offset spatula, and started adding small amounts of blue all over the cake. Then I smoothed it out with my cake scraper. I added more blue and white until I got my desired look for the sky.

Trees

After each detail I add, I like to put the cake in the refrigerator for a bit. It helps to keep from messing up the previous details that were added. While the cake is in the refrigerator, I put my brown buttercream frosting into a piping bag with the Wilton 48 tip. This tip is the basket weave tip. I used this tip to pipe the trunks and branches of three trees around the cake. I had them go over onto the top of the cake just a little bit as well. Before adding the trees, it is a good time to transfer your cake to the final cake dish you will have it in for the party. I used my Wilton cake lifter for this step. Then I put the cake back in the refrigerator while I worked on getting the green ready for the leaves.

For the green frosting, I put it into a piping bag that had a plastic coupler. This allowed me to be able to change the piping tip from a leaf to a grass look without changing piping bags. The leaf tip I used was Wilton 67. This was a pretty fun part of the decorating. I started piping leaves all over the branches and filled in open spaces until I loved how the trees looked!

Fondant and Grass Details

Now it is time to start adding a few of the fondant details I made a week ago for this dinosaur cake. I took some of the blue buttercream, and spread a small amount on the back of my dinosaur and number 7 cutouts. This helped to glue them onto the side of the cake. After that, I switched out my leaf tip with my grass tip (Tip #233). I then added grass around the bottom edge of the cake, going in and around the fondant decorations. This is where I stopped until the day of the party. I have heard that fondant doesn’t do well in the refrigerator, so I didn’t want to put my pterodactyl topper in the refrigerator.

Before wrapping the cake with plastic wrap, I let it sit in the refrigerator for about 15 minutes, so the buttercream details could harden. Then I wrapped the whole cake with plastic wrap, and put it in the refrigerator for the night. I kept all of my buttercream frosting in sealed bags and dishes out on the counter.

Pterodactyl Dinosaur Cake Time!

About two hours before the party, I took the cake out of the refrigerator and unwrapped it. Then I added my remaining white buttercream frosting to a piping bag with my Wilton 2A tip. I piped one large cloud in the center of the top of the cake, and smoothed it out with my offset spatula where needed. Then I added a few smaller clouds around that large cloud, so it wouldn’t be lonely. Lastly, I sat my fondant pterodactyl topper on top of that large cloud. The dinosaur cake is now ready for the party!

Party Decorations

So the dinosaur cake wasn’t the only decoration at this party. My kids and I went to the Dollar Tree expecting to get plain cups and plates for her party. To my surprise, the Dollar Tree had all sorts of different dinosaur themed decorations. Plus, they had dinosaur toys, glow sticks, and masks that we could use as decorations and toys to give to the cousins. Dollar Tree for the win!

The only decorations that were made by me, were the Happy Birthday banner and the 7th heart. I made the Happy Birthday banner with fabric and white vinyl using my Cricut machine. This banner has been used for every family birthday since my daughter’s 1st birthday. For both of my kids, I make a decoration to go with the banner that shows the theme of the party and their age. Then I get to keep it, so they always have an item from each birthday that reminds them of each year’s theme. I love this little tradition!

Next Week

Now that my daughter’s birthday is over, and we are all feeling better, we will be working on school this next week. I’m not sure what we will be learning, but it is definitely time for us to get back into a routine. Even though that past few weeks of vacation and being sick have been nice, it definitely renewed my excitement for teaching in 2024.

It is rather cold here right now. According to the news, it is rather cold everywhere. Hopefully, everyone is managing to stay warm and finding fun indoor activities to do with your kids. We just have a bunch of dinosaur activities to do, now that she has all these cool dinosaur gifts. One thing that she got was a rock tumbler, so we plan on trying that out this week too. I will share the results with you once they are done!

The best part of teaching your children, is that it allows you to be in the Word of God daily. Sometimes life gets so busy that you don’t always make time for the Bible. Homeschooling makes time for it, and I absolutely love starting each day in the Bible with my daughter. “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.” Matthew 4:4 I pray that your mind is renewed daily as you start each day in the Bible with your children. Have a wonderful week friends!