All of my sewing friends will have to be patient with this one.  When you have an 8 year old son, life is more about finding nerf bullets, watching hockey, and hearing about Minecraft worlds, than it is about sewing gorgeous bags and quilts. My life needs to fit nicely around and in between the above mentioned activities and part of that is knowing that it's my job to make an awesome cake, perfect for the "trend" of the year. Minecraft of course! If you know who Steve is, and have heard about Ender Dragons, and diamond pick-axes... please read on, otherwise - thank you for sticking with me!

A Minecraft Cake complete with Steve, a dog, pig, a creeper and trees.

My son's birthday cake would NOT have happened without his talented and industrious Auntie Shelley - SHE made all of the fondant figures for the cake and I only had the task of cake and icing. I made the cake at my house, she made the figures. We met at the Laser Quest party, and she assembled while the kids and big man-kids had a blast playing laser tag. I have to say, I've never seen a group of kids so excited about a cake before! It was CAKE SUCCESS and a VERY happy birthday boy!!  Ahem, I only wish I took better photos.

A Minecraft Cake complete with Steve, a dog, pig, a creeper and trees.

This was too easy.  I made two square chocolate cakes and trimmed off the rounded edges.  I sliced one straight down the center and pulled it apart to leave an opening in the middle.  I cut 1/4 off of the other, and 2/3 of the piece that was cut off was put between the two halves of the first cake. The large piece of the second cake was set on top (a bit saggy, but oh well!) and the small 1/3rd cut off was set up in the corner for the candle.


I froze the cake so it would be easy to ice, and put a thin layer of light green "crumb coat" on top. (I cheated and used a can of Duncan Hines pre-made whipped icing, that I tinted with food colouring.) I put this in the freezer after so it would be easier to add the "grass" after.

A cute little Minecraft Pig!

To make the river and grass, I added blue and green to the same icing in two different bowls and chilled them for a bit so they would be firmer to work with. Using my cupcake piping bag and a couple different tips, I first put the river on and then started in with the grass. I didn't have a proper cake board, so I ended up icing right on the tray. I've never iced like this before and there were a few "oops!" but it was fun anyway! No this is probably not the right way to ice a cake, BUT gee I don't make cakes, I SEW!!!!

Shelley said making the fondant figures was SO FUN!!  She loved playing with the icing colours and making the shapes.  Since our boys are 8, our play doh days have been almost non-existent, so I think it may have been fun for her to do some creating of her own again.