Happy Birthday!

My little man turned one recently - I can't believe how quickly the last year has gone! From my little squidgy baby to a walking tornado of blond hair and giggles. We decided to throw a small party for him and my sister and I spent a lovely couple of hours baking a cake.

If you grew up in Australia in the 80's the preparations for your birthday would probably have included several hours poring over the Women's Weekly Children's Birthday Cake book. The agonizing decisions - the beautiful butterfly or the pink number seven! What about the candy castle?

When the little man was born I bought a copy of the original 80's version from Ebay - it's has dated a little but my sister and I had a lovely afternoon deciding which cake to cook. We eventually decided on the classic number one - yellow butter icing and smarties.

The cake itself was simple - an orange scented butter cake, covered with a thick layer of butter icing. The most time consuming part was putting the smarties on - the smarties were distinctly less vividly coloured and glossy than I remembered from my childhood but the effect was still fun

We also made chocolate crackles to complete the nostalgia trip - they were as popular at my office the next day as they were at the birthday party. Happy birthday little man! What cake shall we do next year?