Owl Smash Cake for 1st Birthday

The youngest of our family (my niece) turned one this week and we got to celebrate her birthday over the weekend.  My sister-in-law is a photographer (FB page and her photos are linked to her site), so of course we had to make a smash cake and capture the baby tearing into the cake.  She went right for the owl.

The owl cake was the second of two cakes for the weekend birthday festivities since we were celebrating both birthdays together.  With a lot going on last week with my birthday, basketball games and social gatherings, I had a late Friday night in front of me.

The owl cake was made of two 6" round chocolate cakes.  The rest of the cake shown below was for the igloo cake and cupcakes.

The decorating photos are a little dark because it was a lot dark outside between the hours of 9:30pm and 1:00am.  Much like my sister-in-law's wedding flowers, she let me have complete creative license with this cake.  I decided I wanted to try a petal cake.  Here's how:  after crumb coating, pipe large dots up the side of the cake.

 Then taking the handle of a spoon or knife, place the end in the center of the dot, press down and smear the frosting.

 Add another line of dots going up the side of the cake and smear the dots.  Repeat until finished.

I didn't know how to end the petal design, so I piped dots and then placed large candy pearls in the center and then around the top of the cake for a little extra embellishment.

I colored some of the left-over fondant from the igloo cake to make the owl.  At first, I started layering scalloped circles for the feathers on the owl's belly and I just couldn't get it to work as I had envisioned.  After 5 frazzled attempts with the clock ticking beyond midnight (which meant it was my son's birthday and he was staying up with me!), I simplified and thought of the owl cookies I had just decorated.  Duh, use the oval cutter.

The body was cut from the oval cookie cutter, the ears & wings were cut with the corner of the square scalloped cookie cutter and the eyes were cut with a small scalloped cookie cutter.  I still had some royal icing eyes left over from the penguin cookie set.  The tree branch is chocolate fondant.  I gave the owl a quilted look by gently rolling the pizza cutter across the body and placing pink sugar pearls.

 Speaking of quilting...this is the owl quilt my mom sewed for the baby.  Baby's reaction to the quilt:  she squealed!

Oh that little tongue!

This little doll is on the petite side and she was careful about tearing into her cake- not really sure what was supposed to happen.

I got a kick out of how many people were concerned that the cake was just for the baby and no one else.  It's a SMASH CAKE!

I wasn't sure how penguins and owls would go over together, but it worked!

I love making cakes that make birthdays just a little more special.