Bookworm Birthday Girl!

We officially have a teenager in the house! People seem to want me to feel bad about that or like time is passing too quickly - to me it seems time is passing as it should be, one day at a time. For several weeks I had been asking Bronwyn about a birthday theme, it took a while but a theme finally came around - Chapter 13. She loves reading so it was perfect! We found some plates and napkins that had books on them and she found a cake she really loved. It had little fondant books all over it. The problem was? We had to make all the books. She made a bunch of books, then the night before we put the cake together we made a bunch more and leaves. The night we put the cake together She decided we needed some flowers so we piped a bunch of flowers too. Once we got to cake construction we had to do some playing to get things just the way she wanted. I piped Chapter 13 a few times and froze it on parchment paper so we could peel the paper back and lay it on the top of the cake. All that hard work made a beautiful cake for a beautiful girl. She asked for strawberry buttercream which is really easy with a bag of dehydrated strawberries in the chopper to make it into powder. I had fun making this cake with my girl. Looking forward to the next one!

Funfetti Yellow Cake
1 yellow cake mix
1 vanilla pudding mix
1/2 cup sprinkles
ingredients listed on cake mix

Mix cake mix with listed ingredients, pudding mix, and sprinkles and bake according to the package directions. Freeze before putting the cake together for easier cake building.

Strawberry Buttercream Frosting
1 1/2 cups butter, at room temperature (3 sticks)
4 1/2 cups powdered sugar
3 - 4 Tbsp heavy cream
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 oz Freeze Dried Strawberries - ground into powder

In the bowl of an electric stand mixer, using the paddle or whisk attachment whip butter on medium-high speed (if using whisk attachment whip on high speed) until nearly white and very fluffy, about 7 - 8 minutes, frequently scraping down the sides of the bowl.
Add in powdered sugar, heavy cream, strawberry powder, and vanilla extract and mix on low speed until blended, then increase speed to medium and beat until very light and fluffy, about 5 - 6 minutes, frequently scraping down the sides of the bowl.
Immediately spread over cooled cake or cupcakes.