Hey Emma!
Kate asked for a birthday party this year to celebrate the beginning of her teenage years. Though we like to have parties every once in a while, she hasn’t had a birthday party in eight years so I wanted to make it extra special. She made a guest list and sent out the invitations and I got to work on making her birthday cake. This year she was very specific. She requested a tall pink coconut cake with a coconut vanilla sponge with alternating layers of Swiss coconut buttercream and raspberry filling.

The “naked” coconut cake. Yes, I destroyed the kitchen in the process.
Personally, I kind of liked the look of a naked cake, but Kate wanted it frosted with bright pink icing and covered in pink coconut.
The Viking said that it reminded him of a giant Hostess snowball. Which, by the way, has inspired me to make a new version of this cake as a homage to the treat (recipe coming soon). We used the cake as a centerpiece for the party, maintaining the theme of pink, pale blues and greens throughout.
Because I wanted her to have a super cute party but am pretty short on time, I stuck to paper lanterns, tassels from Zurchers and three shades of pink and white balloons, with store bought treats to match the color theme. One of my favorite things about this particular party was the combination of home and ready made treats and decor. One of the challenges I face working full time is trying to create events that feel special without spending a fortune when I don’t have a lot of spare time to do things from scratch.
I poured valentine themed chocolates in my favorite glass jars (which I use for nearly everything) added scoops like these from Amazon and let the guests build their own combinations in treat cups like these. Zurchers has so many cute styles, it’s hard to choose only one color. I like to mix and match.
Then we just added some store bought Loft house cookies, pizza, party games and let the girls take it from there. They played “murder in the dark”, “exploding kittens”, “try not to laugh” and were reduced giggles for hours. It was the great beginning to hopefully a fantastic year!
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