Snow Globe Cake & a Cakes.com Giveaway!

Hello artsy friends! It’s Amy’s very happy birthday, so time to take over the blog to share her fun birthday cake. Since Amy is a December baby, and loves anything that sparkles, a snow globe cake seemed like a perfect choice for our little birthday get together at… where else?… Starbucks. Complete with sparkly snow, this cake did not disappoint. Thanks to our friends over at Cakes.com, {who sponsored this post, but all opinions are my own} I had everything I needed to put this together in no time. Read on to learn how you can make this fun cake for your winter birthday friends or holiday parties. Let it snow, let it snow… okay, maybe not.

Before I give you the play by play, I’d like to point out how fantastic it was to just go to www.cakes.com (in my pj’s, too!) and just order some of the things I needed to make this cake. It’s such a busy time of year that I appreciated the luxury of doing that after the children were nestled, all snug in their beds. I thank them for the convenience of having my tools shipped straight to my door.

You’ll need:

Pastry bags
Couplers
Star Tip (I used a #17, so #14 if you want a little smaller, #18 if you want a little larger):
Piping Tip #4 for the decorations and writing
Piping Tip #7 for the bead border
Foil to wrap your cake board with, to fancy it up, if you don’t have a pre-fancied one

You will also need:

Your favorite cake recipe with 2, 8 inch layers
A sugar cone
Buttercream frosting
Sweetened flaked coconut
Edible sparkles
A small amount of fondant
Gel colors
A fish bowl (preferably without a fish living in it)

Now, let’s get started, shall we? Bake your favorite cake and stack two 8 inch layers with buttercream in the middle. Frost it with white buttercream, as smooth as you wish. The cake is the base of your snow globe. Invert the fishbowl onto the top of the frosting, so it leaves an imprint, then remove the bowl. This is where you will pile on as little or as much flaked coconut as you’d like. Sprinkle some edible sparkles into it to really get the look of snow inside a snow globe.

Next you want to color some buttercream green and spread it all over the sugar cone.

You’ll pipe stars with the star tip, pulling the icing a bit at each end, differing lengths, to look like pine needles, all over the cone. I went from the bottom up. Place it in the center of the snow pile. I wiggled it down into the snow a bit, and touched up any disturbed pine needles.

Next, you’ll want to choose which color you want for your border and letters, and which colors you’d like to decorate the tree with. Pipe ornaments on the tree with the smaller piping tip, and use the larger round piping tip to pipe a bead border around the edge of the cake, top and bottom.

Now pipe on whatever message or design you want on the base of the snow globe. “Happy Birthday, Amy” was the obvious choice for us! Then you are ready to put the bowl back onto the cake over the tree.

The base of a fishbowl is flat… if you like it that way, you may leave it. I chose to color a small amount of fondant gold, shape it into a finial for the dome, and place it on top with some coconut and sparkles around it, for a finished look. You can really get creative with this part. You can use a large gumdrop, or a bow… really whatever pleases you. It’s your cake, and you are in charge! It’s nice how it works that way, isn’t it?

Now your cake is finished. Not too difficult, was it? This cake was so pretty, and so seasonally appropriate, and so honestly do-able. With the help of cakes.com it took me no time at all for the wow-factor. The birthday girl certainly enjoyed it. Happy birthday, Amy! We love you more than glitter and tiaras! Here’s to many more artsy years. Stay sweet, friends!

Now, here’s some exciting news for you…Cakes.com is offering One Artsy Mama readers two special things. First, we get an exclusive 20% discount sitewide; just use the code save20 at checkout!

Second, they’re offering one lucky winner a $50 value decorating pack. Use the Rafflecopter below to get your entries in. {Sorry, international friends, this one’s for US residents only.} Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway