There’s no getting around the stress of our children’s birthday parties.

SO… I make sure to have a delicious cake and ice cream in order to indulge, alone, afterwards.

For Rory’s fourth birthday I chose to make her cake. The recipe was actually saved from summer 2017. As I mentioned, I’m a Southern Living subscriber and this adorable pink sheet cake, labeled “for a daughter’s birthday” jumped off the pages with Rory in mind.

The recipe was fairly easy to follow and it didn’t take much time. I was able to make it in an evening. About 30 minutes to make the cake, 3o minutes to bake, an hour to cool and 20 minutes to ice. I started around 8:30 and finished up, pans scrubbed too, by 11 p.m.

 

Three things that caught me off guard:

1) Freeze dried strawberries are not frozen strawberries. They actually come in a little air-tight bag on the grocery shelves with the healthy granola bars and gluten free snack crackers. I had to ask for some help finding them, and learned about the Kroger app which has been severely missing in my life.

2) The recipe calls for a jelly roll pan, which my mom assures is not a standard 9×13 cake/casserole pan. I used an ancient hand-me-down pan that was somewhere in between sizes. I do suggest you check this out before continuing because it might affect your bake time (leave it in a little longer if you go with a sheet pan).

3) I thought I had to make a special stop at Michaels craft store to get high quality sprinkles. I did, and they were okay, but turns out our Kroger’s grocery had a better selection and I would have been fine foregoing the special (expensive) sprinkles.

 

 

Now to the real reason I even throw parties – the invite! Rory decided early this year she wanted a butterfly party, then changed her mind a dozen times, and finally I insisted this was the best way to proceed. I love how the invites turned out, of course pink; I can feel the flutters of these precious butterflies. Send me a message if you think you could use the same design, I’ve already had a request for note cards.

 

 

 

Links:

Rory’s swim suit : Old Navy (fights tight, size 5 was snug)

Edible Pink Butterflies : Sugar Robot, Etsy (perfect for baby showers, they were delicate & divine!)

Not pictured : butterfly wings from Dollar Tree and CUTIE favors from Target $1 Aisle.