Coolest Owl First Birthday Cake

This owl first birthday cake was the perfect cake for celebrating my granddaughter’s 1st birthday. My granddaughter loves owls.

My daughter is a New York City Urban Park Ranger. She loves teaching bird identification! We have an owl tree carving in our front yard. The first thing my granddaughter wants to do when she comes to Grandma’s house is to say, “hello” to the owls.

The theme of my granddaughter’s baby shower was owls. Her first birthday party was held at the Museum of the Hudson Highlands (of course there was an owl there). Her first birthday cake had to be an owl.

I made and transported the cake in two sections: the tree stump and the owl.

The tree stump was three layers of cake which I carved to look like a tree stump. I first covered the stump in butter cream and put it in the refrigerator to firm up. Then, I made several batches of assorted brown colored marshmallow fondant. I covered the top of the stump with a disc of brown fondant, etched with concentric circles to represent the rings in a tree. I created the “bark” of the stump by rolling long, thin, “snakes” of different shades of brown fondant, then individually pressed onto the sides of the stump.

The owl was also three layers of cake which I carved to look like an owl. Again, after carving I covered the cake in butter cream and put it in the fridge to firm up. I made two batches of marshmallow fondant: pink and green. I used a little of the leftover brown fondant from the tree stump. On the very bottom, I made little feet. I cut out lots of feather shaped pieces of pink fondant, attaching them one at a time until the owl was covered. Then I made the face using green and brown fondant!

I wrapped everything in plastic and prayed that it would survive the one hour trip to the party.
It took 12 hours to make!

This was the 2nd decorative cake I have made. People loved the cake and hinted that they would love me to make a cake for them… but 12 hours!!! I will just be making special cakes for my grandchildren. How do people make a living making cakes?

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