The Little Mermaid Birthday Party

Every year that my daughter has had a birthday, I’ve gone a little…overboard with her parties.  Her first birthday was a luau, then her second birthday was Minnie Mouse themed.  But this year, it has been the most fun.  Since she’s turning 3, she’s more aware of what’s going on.  She also LOVES birthday parties.  So, when it was time for hers to come around, she was beside herself with excitement, and talked about it nonstop.  Seriously, nonstop.  She even fussed at the dogs for taking one of the goodie bags that Mommy made for her friends that were coming to her party.  I got a kick out of that.  “No doggies, this is for my birthday party!  You leave it alone!” And her teachers at school said that she’s continuously talking about it there, asking her little friends if they’re coming to her birthday party.

Several months ago, I couldn’t decide between Hello Kitty and The Little Mermaid, so I let her watch the movie.  Done.  She loved it.  So, I started going over some things that I wanted to have for her party.

First, here’s the birthday cake.  Of course, you have to have either birthday cake or some other birthday dessert at a party, right?  So, here it is.  This is an oval cake, 3 layers of yellow cake with chocolate chips, chocolate filling, and covered with buttercream icing.  Click HERE for the cake topper set I used for this cake, and HERE for the oval pan set I used.

Originally, I was just going to use the figurines for the top of the cake, but it felt like it was missing something.  So, after a little bit of brainstorming after putting the cake together, I decided to make a 3 out of chocolate and use that as the topper, but create a little island for it and put the “dinglehopper” on there as well.  My nephew ate the chocolate 3.  He loves it when I make chocolate.  Click HERE for the number chocolate mold topper I used.  Click HERE for the food chopper used to create the graham cracker crumbs.  I use this sucker all the dang time.

King Triton, Sebastian and the castle!  Since I set this cake up so that these characters were technically under the sea, I wanted to do a little bit of decorating with fondant on top of the buttercream icing.  I pulled up a picture of the castle on my phone, and tried to replicate it as best as I could to just use it as a backdrop, cutting out different sized pieces and putting them all together.  The rocks, coral and seaweed are also made out of fondant.

Ursula and her cave.  When I was looking at the details of her cave, I knew that copying that would be more challenging, and the clock was ticking away…so I decided to just make a simple, but large cave that doesn’t look all that inviting.  Shoot, the seawitch’s cave shouldn’t look inviting!  I certainly wouldn’t want to go swimming in there!

Cupcakes!  These are strawberry cupcakes with blue tinted cream cheese icing, topped with graham cracker crumbs for the sand effect, and topped with chocolate seashells.  Click HERE for a chocolate seashell mold.

The chocolate yummies!  I made all of these using different colors, and put them on a glass plate with graham cracker crumbs to look like they’re all on top of sand.  I made these same chocolate decorations for my nephew’s Shark Cake earlier this year.  They’re super cute, and super yummy too!  Click HERE for the chocolate molds I used for these creatures.  In order to make chocolates with different colors, use a toothpick to distribute the chocolate, and let it set before putting other chocolate colors over it.

And here’s one of the most popular items I make for parties…Candy Sushi!  I also ended up slicing some Swiss Cake Rolls for added “sushi” to the platter, but everything else is hand made using rice krispie treats and different candy.

Here’s the full dessert table.  Packed with all the yummy goodies!  Sugar overload!  Click HERE for the table decorating kit I used in this picture.

Pink lemonade, anyone?  I bought the drink fountain specifically for this party, because the thought of beautiful pink lemonade streaming down like this would be perfect for this occasion.  Click HERE for the drink fountain used in this picture.

Here is her birthday banner.  One of my friends (who I like to call Martha Stewart’s protégé), made this for the party.  She’s the one who made all of the amazing stuff for her son’s Superhero Birthday Party earlier this year.

And, here’s what she also made for the front door.  So cute!  It’s still there!

My little pumpkin, we’re singing the Happy Birthday song to her in this picture, with her friends and cousins standing around her.

It was a great party, with a wonderful turnout.  I told people to come hungry, because the dessert table was less than half of the amount of other food.  We also had a chicken cheese ball with crackers, crab dip in bread bowl, deviled eggs, chips and salsa, shells and cheese, cheesy poofs, ham delights, chicken tenders, pigs in a blanket, and a veggie tray.  Our little birthday girl was tuckered out early, from a very busy day, no nap, and a full belly.  🙂