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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To have made ds a homemade birthday cake?

105 replies

ineedsomeinspiration · 18/12/2013 00:05

Its chocolate with chocolate butter cream icing, chocolate fingers round the edge and a smartie number 2 on the top.
Everyone else I know seems to purchase elaborate creations for thier lo birthdays. I'm too scared to post a picture anywhere in case I win bad mum of the year award. Pretty sure it will taste lovely.
Will ds be scared for life at not having a three tier fireman ssm cake?

OP posts:

SmiteYouWithThunderbolts · 18/12/2013 17:47

YANBU. Supermarket cakes taste dry and overly sweet. Bleurgh. Mine get homemade monstrosities works of art each year. They're not iced with character emblems or photos of One Direction, but they're tasty as hell.

thankfeckitschrismas · 18/12/2013 17:57

I always make my dd's cake, she loves having the exact one she wants and it tastes fab.

Even when it goes wrong! She wanted a crinoline lady cake so I used a bunt cake ring but it rose hugely in the middle and not so much at the edges. It looked like a ufo with a hole in the middle!

Until I piped white chocolate butter finger and milk chocolate butter icing using a star shaped nozzle. It looked like a crown when I had finished and she was in awe!

VeniseAndMe · 18/12/2013 18:03

I do the cakes too and they are never as elaborate as yours seem to be.
Felt bad about it when I first did as they were never looking as nice.
That is until I started getting comments from parents sling the lines of 'did you just make that cake? It was lovely. So much micer than the ones you buy'
Compared to the one year I couldn't be bothered to bake, did the whole I am having a cake done and no one commented on it or found it was better/nicer looking. Not worth the money ime

BabyDubsEverywhere · 18/12/2013 18:09

I used to make the dc cakes, I am a decent baker but I cant do a lot with fancy icing so they look homemade. DS1 and DD1 are now at an age to want their fave characters above taste - so I buy them in. I'll make them again when they prefer substance to style again :D

Bunbaker · 18/12/2013 18:25

You can buy cake toppers with characters on them and put them on top of a home made cake. Win win.

pictish Were we separated at birth?

DrCoconut · 18/12/2013 18:31

I always make the DCs cakes. DS1 was 15 a couple of weeks ago and wanted home made as you get to have it how you want it, he's autistic and fussy though. DS2 just sees cake. He will be 3 next year.

PasswordProtected · 18/12/2013 18:41

Whoever buys cake?
OK for wedding cake, maybe you have one made or have one decorated by a "professional" but otherwise home-made every time.

MrsDavidBowie · 18/12/2013 18:42

I can't make cakes to save my life, but a friend can, so she would always make them one.
I did splash out on a Little Mermaid cake once from the local bakers, and I have to say it was lovely.

turningvioletviolet · 18/12/2013 18:53

Oh come on - this is nothing more than a stealth boast. Who honestly has the time to worry about whether they make or buy a birthday cake? No one cares (and i mean that in the nicest possible way). Make it, buy it - i don't know one single solitary person who would care enough to judge (believe me, i have 3 dcs and have been on the birthday cake merry go round for nearly 17 years).

IThinkThat · 18/12/2013 19:02

Your cake sounds lovely, I am making my DS some cupcakes for his birthday with THESE on top. Classy stuff.

Mim78 · 18/12/2013 19:03

No it is amazing you have made one. I only buy because unable to make.

pictish · 18/12/2013 19:03

Who's judging? We're just saying we think homemade tastes nicer than shop bought...what's wrong with that?
I like green better than blue - am I judging blue?

As for stealth boast - making a sponge cake is child's play. Hardly something to pat oneself on the back about.
I make a mean mince and tatties as well.

Rubybrazilianwax · 18/12/2013 19:19

Bad mummy. Go buy one and give that homemade one to me evil

HollaAtMeBaby · 18/12/2013 22:32

Yes, it's very unreasonable of you to have made your child a birthday cake. Are you trying to spoil him? Next year, just stick a candle into a dish of Tesco value dog food.

Glitterfeet · 18/12/2013 22:57

I'm loving the smartie number two on top. I can just see the smartie man coming and having a dump on the cake

InTheSpirit · 18/12/2013 23:01

I always do the DC's homemade bday cakes, as the ones from the shops taste funny...

Homemade tasted much better IMHO

YANBU and enjoy the cake

Original poster

ineedsomeinspiration · 18/12/2013 23:04

Not boasting trust me it did not look boadt worthy ay all. Ds loved it though, particularly blowing the candles out.
Seriously though I have several friends who have dc of similar ages all of whom have had elaborate fondant creations that they have had made.
Always goes wrong when I try and do anything complicated with icing. Once made my brother a cake that looked like a laptop. The black food colouring in the icing turned everyone's mouths black.

OP posts:

Glitterfeet · 18/12/2013 23:06

Holla you need the old Blue Peter classic

www.bbc.co.uk/cult/classic/bluepeter/makes/petscake.pdf

Glitterfeet · 18/12/2013 23:09

Ineedsomeinspiration

I can't make cakes look nice either and have friends who make gorgeous looking cakes. If we 're doing a party I'll buy one, if not it's the home made gooey mess.

HollaAtMeBaby · 18/12/2013 23:14

Glitterfeet that is AMAZING!

Plomino · 18/12/2013 23:16

I can make a mean cake , but my decorating skills are spectacularly shit. So I just cover the whole thing in chocolate buttercream or something like a ganache then cover it in chocolate sprinkles and maltesers. Its never level, not even close to symmetrical, and
DS2 has just eaten the last slice , as he was 16 today. Having done a quick survey, general consensus is they prefer homemade personally, rather than picking the nasty tasting icing off, and then finding they didnt much like the sponge either.

But if others prefer shop bought, why not ? I get the excitement of choosing it totally. Each has their own merits .

GenericNWFucker · 18/12/2013 23:21

My DCs, who are considerably older than two, feel let down if they ever get a shop cake! I simply didn't have time for DS1 last year on the day because of work and he was really disappointed :( we had a second cake at the weekend to make up for it! Seriously OP - the love with which you make the cake is appreciated much more by the kids than the artistic merits! I had always assumed the DCs were vaguely ashamed of my cack-handed efforts. Not so!

Gladvent · 18/12/2013 23:25

I made DD a cake when she was 3. MIL took one look at it and said 'oh if I'd have realised you were going to make a cake I'd have offered to buy you a proper one. Now she spends £££ at the bakers twice a year to keep her grandchildren in proper cakes

EBearhug · 19/12/2013 01:08

IThinkThat, doesn't that count as child abuse? At the very least they will surely induce nightmares.

Bunbaker · 19/12/2013 07:04

" i don't know one single solitary person who would care enough to judge"

DD would. She would feel very let down if I had just bought a supermarket cake.

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