Cake icing and decorating novice - please help!

[GuybrushThreepwoodMightyPirate]

It's DD1's birthday in a fortnight and I have to up my game, cake-wise this year. I need to produce a passable Peppa Pig cake for her party. I have no idea how best to do this

I am able to make decent sponge cake but really don't know where to start with icing and decorating. I think maybe I should make a simple, two layer round sponge cake and ice with that smooth icing you roll out - where do I get this from? Do I need to add the colour myself? What is it called? What is the best method for making this look smooth and well finished? How do I decorate from there?

Please help me! I am completely out of my depth! I tried googling cake ideas and spent 20 minutes feeling enormously inadequate and

Don't panic!!!

If you can make a Madeira sponge that would be better so you're not wrestling with crumbs.

The BBC website is really good for helping you.

I'd suggest 1kg of the block stuff and colour it with either the paste or powder (you can order these online) or go to Hobbycraft to get them.

When it comes to rolling it out keep it thick and use a tape measure. I measure the diameter of the cake plus the height twice. Add all these numbers together so you know how big you need to roll the fondant out. There will probably be leftover fondant and you can make piggies out of it (depending on the colour obvs). Or just buy a smaller pack and do that one. You can buy the blocks of fondant from supermarkets and specialist cake suppliers and Hobbycraft.

Thank you! I think I will have to do a trial run next week to make sure it goes well. Fingers crossed! My dd will be thrilled if I pull this off.

Take a look on youtube, its full of tutorials on how to do them. If you struggle, you can get printed cake toppers on Ebay, though peppa isn't too hard

If you want it Peppa shaped, prints picture out to make a template, bake an oblong madeira and cut around the picture. Asda sell the paste colours now, you only need a small amount, or you can buy it ready coloured though it is more expensive. I'm a hobby baker, so just ask if you need anymore help

I can bake a cake, but I cannot decorate.
If it was me, I'd make round cake, and cover in pink butter icing (beat butter til soft, add in twice the weight of sifted icing sugar, and a small amount of red food dye, beat til smooth), and then put one of these on top.

Brilliant! I will try to do a fondant one but will have the preprinted topper as a fallback if I fail. This is why I love MN