She's 12!! Still hard to believe that in ONE year she will be a teenager! I'm going to need this next year to go by suuuuper slow!! I'm not ready for that! Like, not at all! Obviously I can't slow down time, because believe me if I could, I would! So I will just be enjoying this next year of having a preteen slowly, taking it all in and spending as much one on one time with her as I can before she ditches me for her friends! (Which she kind of already does.) She is definitely in preteen mode!
This year she wanted to bring her friends to the movies or bowling as a part of her birthday party so I thought dinner and a movie was a cute idea! I thought something small, with her closest friends would be nice that way the house wouldn't be too crowded and I could fit them all at my dinning room table. I wasn't sure of a theme for the decor but when I came across a cake on Instagram from Jenny's Cookies I knew I had to have something similar!
So I decided to make her cake myself this year. I never make cakes (you may have read that on another post as well lol) because I'm not that great at frosting them but since this was a naked cake, and you scrape most of the frosting off I knew I could handle it! It came out so pretty; I used faux flowers from Michael's and the sparkler candles from Meri Meri. The best part was it came out absolutely delicious! I used a trick to make a boxed cake taste like one baked from scratch and it makes it super moist!
The trick to getting a boxed cake to taste like it's from scratch is to substitute the water for milk, add one or 2 extra eggs than what's directed on the box (I usually just use 1 extra), and replace the oil with butter but double that amount. So if it's half a cup of oil, you want to use 1 cup of butter. I'm telling you this is a game changer! Your cake will be more flavorful and be so moist! For this cake I found a super simple recipe on Pinterest to make the strawberry mousse, but I modified it a little and it came out delicious as well!
I set the table with a burlap runner, gold chargers and cute pink plastic plates I found at Home Goods. I made them a pink mocktail and sugared the rims of their glasses to make it look fancy! I also put menus and place cards on the table as well.
Favors were gable boxes that had popcorn, candy, and a juice box for the movie theatre as well as hair ties for a little something that they could take home.
After dinner, cake, and presents we piled up in 2 cars and went to see "The House with the Clock in it's Walls." The girls enjoyed the movie, I thought it was pretty good as well. All in all another successful party!
Happy birthday Jaya!
XO,
