Ponyo Birthday Cake

I know honeypie's birthday was 2 months ago but i thought i'd post some pictures of the cake I  made....  (mainly for katherine whose little one loves ponyo as much as honeypie does!!)

There was one major mistake and i thought i'd just tell you about it now ... 

what a bad and silly  oversite on my part...but that is what decorating at 3 am does... i totally forgot to put in reinforcing dowels in the cake and that is why we have a green bucket that seems to be wrinkling downwards... :(  i cant believe i would do such a thing.... bummer.

BUT anyhow... it was a lovely birthday and honeypie loved the cake!

 PONYO IN HER GREEN BUCKET!

I used  3,  9" inch round cakes...

stacked them on top of each other with vanilla buttercream frosting

Then came the fondant... i used a light green gel to color the fondant

Rolled it out ...

covered the cake with it...

I added light blue to the butter cream on placed it on top of the cake for water...

NOW PLEASE INSERT DOWELS INTO THE CAKE HERE AT THIS POINT...

;)

now for PONYO...

i made the body out of rice krispie treats and melted marshmallows...

I covered the body with flesh colored fondant and red fondant

and placed her on top of the cake ...I added a handle to the bucket and eyes and hair to ponyo...

The cake was a great flavour of vanilla with vanilla buttercream and chocolate chips... mmmmmm

here is some crafts we made during the party... 

finger puppets on a stick of ponyo and totoro

we also made totoro birthday hats out of card stock paper...

and we had all the kids work on an underwater collaged mural.   We pasted paper on a wall.

It was a great day filled with dancing, playing,  craft making, candy sushi making, and cake eating!!!

ps katherine...  thanks for reading!!!  

^_^  ~birdycake

Ponyo cookies

We do not get tired of ponyo activities!!!! :)

Last week we made ponyo cookies and collages !
For the cookie we used a great sugar cookie recipe.
(one from the Martha Stewart "cookie" book, for using with cookie cutters.)
The recipe has a little less butter so that the cookies hold their sculpted shape while in the oven.
We dyed the cookie dough using Wilton color food gels.









Ponyo colors!
Beige for head and circle on her belly. Red for her body and orange for her head.





Here honeypie and her cousins mold fishy form ponyo












We baked them for 15 minutes at 350*





A little brown on the edges...
We forgot to put the timer... :(













And some ponyo collages...
























We LOVE ponyo!!!!!
^_^

Ponyo birthday too!

Here we are making goodie bags for honeypie's birthday! Handmade Ponyo puppets in little green buckets just like the movie!
Though honeypie has been so sick with 104 fever... We had to cancel her party but postponed it for later in the month ...
So stay tuned for cake and party pictures!









card stock makes a good stencil material









I used fabric glue to glue all the face features...






















I used fabric glue to glue the head onto the sewn body.












Found these buckets at party city and thank god for Easter grass! Blue for water!













P-o-n-y-o ! Ponyo!








-- Post From My iPhone
^_^ birdycake on the go!

A Totoro birthday and felted acorns

It's honeypie's birthday!!!
She is in love with Totoro and Ponyo, (both characters from movies by Hayao Miyazaki) and she has asked for a ponyo / totoro birthday... So here I go on a full craft week to make totoro / ponyo goodies for her special day !
Today we made invitations and wet felted acorns .
In the movie "My neighbor Totoro ", Totoro, ( a forest spirit ) gives Mai and Satsuki a little bundle wrapped in leaves. When the girls open the package they find, to their surprise, a bunch of acorns for them to plant. Message: protect and respect nature and always plant for more growth. I read an article that Miyazaki made the movie to bring awareness to the Japanese Sayama forest.
 (Take a look at the totoro forest project here).
So in honor of that, we made wet felted acorns and wrapped them in felt leaves, like bundles, inspired by the movie to put into goodie bags.

Here are our invitations for our party (collaged paper)...











Got these stamps on eBay !!






Here's what you need to wet felt the little balls for the acorns...
Wool roving, warm soapy water, and a washboard.







Wool roving ( I bought mine on etsy)...






Make a little ball with the bundle. Dip the ball into warm soapy water, squeeze and roll between your hands, creating friction. Keep dipping into the soapy water, squeezing and rolling.






Roll in circular motion on the washboard.










After about 10 minutes... This is what you will have.
A nicely felted little ball.










To make the acorns , I used real acorn caps and hot glued the wool balls to the inside of the caps.






Beautiful!!










Here are the cut felt leaves to wrap the acorn bundle.

























Now on to Ponyo puppets and cake !
Xo