Stace's Cakes Through the Years

Well, it all started with this one:

And this one, too:

(But I didn't make either of these two!)

Stace's 23rd birthday, his first birthday as a married man, brought him a cake reminiscent of the tropical islands he served his mission on:

As his 24th birthday approached, I wondered how in the world I could top the cake theme I had used the year before?

The only thing I could think of was a cake modeled after his favorite food!

The next month's fourth of July brought a light and fresh alternative to the traditional lard-filled cakes I usually bake. This is an angel-food cake with whipped cream topping and strawberries, raspberries and blueberries. A Kim original! HA! just kidding! I think everyone makes this cake! And it's a good one!

Stace LOVES a good cookie cake, so for Valentine's Day 2009 I whipped one up using my favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe and some homemade icing dyed lots of fun colors!

A few months later when Stace graduated with his undergrad degree, and as we were about to head off to the Swamp, I threw him a surprise party and made two cakes (an FSU cake and a UF cake) to celebrate!

FSU cake was two layers of yellow cake with one chocolate cake layer in between and chocolate frosting, and the Gator cake was red velvet with cream cheese frosting, of course! :D (that recipe had to be tripled to fill the size of the cake pan!)

Last year on his birthday I was a major failure and didn't do a fun cake:*( I remember being so disappointed I had skipped the tradition for a year. But...I had just made the above two cakes the month before his birthday, PLUS...please give me credit because Pregnant Kim went to his favorite place, Sonny's, which I really hated at the time (since then I have come to learn that I do, in fact, like their pulled chicken...but that is neither here nor there.)

Well, this year my attempt at a fun cake was brought back! But this time, it was not one cake, but 12 mini cakes! Or...cupcakes! I made a cupcake cake! White cake and chocolate icing from scratch, piped to quite-far-from-perfection, sprinkled with toffee bits and what?! you thought those were maraschino cherries? Gotchya! They are just red M&M's, silly!

I love you Mr. Twenty-Six-Year-Old-Head!