Pixie Hollow Cake

My daughter turned 5 years old last week, and a few weeks ago i asked her what kind of cake she would like for her birthday. She said Tinkerbell. We looked around the internet and i saw a definite theme with cakes. She said she wanted one with 'lots of fairies'.

I looked around in some stores but no one had any fairies i liked. It's really hard to find little Tinkerbell toys right now. You can find lots of big dolls though. So i hit up Amazon and found a really cute set of fairies that i thought would work as cake toppers.

I had this vision in my head for a BIG cake. Way too big for the amount of people i actually needed to serve. But when i go for it, i generally go big.

However, i had a series of snafus and fail cakes while i was trying to bake. I learned, for example, how not to not make a chocolate chip cake. Who knew that was going to be so difficult? Twice, even? As if i was so sure it was somehow the cake's fault it failed, i had to do it again to see if it wasn't just a fluke that the first one didn't work. Turns out, it was me after all. Ah, life. Trial and error. Good times.

My end result turned out nicely, but there were tears and frustration before i was done.

Making cakes, i have realized that you have to be flexible and take the fail cakes with a resigned determination to succeed next time.

I ended up going with a marble cake. I took a plain white cake recipe and then i split it in half and put 1/4 cup of cocoa powder in it and mixed it so all my cake would require the same baking temperature and time.

The finished product! I learned how to make much more realistic rocks for my lagoon and waterfall, which i am happy about!

I wasn't thrilled about my icing consistency. I need to experiment and find just the right balance for myself, because i wasn't able to get this icing as smooth as i normally strive for. I did get some nice color, however. And this was my first try at edging a cake, but i think i just need some practice.

I really do love the fairies cavorting about!

My daughter was SO thrilled. She told me it's *just* what she wanted. And if you Google fairy cakes, you will see a LOT of cakes in this same theme and with pools and waterfalls and stuff. I am just putting my own spin on a cake that gets a LOT of traffic and attempts. My personal goal is to challenge myself with what i can do. It doesn't all have to be original to be awesome.

This was a really fun cake to do, after i got the shape all figured out!