Vanilla Cake for Baby Shower with Animals Theme

My friend Jackie asked me to make a cake for her daughter’s baby shower, and of course, I was thrilled to do it. Her daughter is having a baby boy and he is going to be named Noah, as in Noah’s ark. The theme was, of course, animals—lots of them. 

I decided to make the cake to match the theme of the animals. I took one of the invitation cards, scanned all the cute animals, printed and cut them out and made them out of royal icing, which is a good way to keep with the theme of the party when you don’t know how to draw. This is how I did it--I cut square pieces of waxed paper, place the paper on the scanned picture cut out, and flooded each image using the colors corresponding to each animal. I could have used my Kopykake projector, but it wasn’t necessary since I was not flooding the images directly on a cake or on a cookie. After I flooded the images with royal icing, I then let them dry overnight. 

Once the cakes were covered with fondant, securely stacked one on top of the other, and decorated, I attached each animal with royal icing and a tiny piece of fondant to the sides of the cake. I also made out of royal icing a lion to fit the top cake.

There were center pieces on the tables decorated with animals (see pictures). Someone carved his named on wood, which will displayed his room and used as decoration. What a neat idea! For the cake I used a recipe that I once found in womansday.com. I also added a box of instant vanilla pudding to the batter. It was a delicious cake.

Ingredients
2 stick(s) (1 cup) unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2cup(s) sugar
1 tablespoon(s) baking powder
1/2 teaspoon(s) salt
4 large eggs
1 cup(s) milk
2 teaspoon(s) vanilla extract
2 2/3cup(s) all-purpose flour

Directions
1. Heat oven to 350ºF.
2. Prepare two 8 x 2-in. round cake pans by either covering with nonstick cooking spray, line bottoms with wax paper and spray the paper, or by greasing the pans and then flouring them—whichever method you’d prefer.
3. Beat butter, sugar, baking powder and salt in a large bowl with mixer on high speed 1 minute or until well blended. 

4. Add eggs; beat 2 minutes or until fluffy. Reduce speed to low and mix in milk and vanilla.
5. Add flour and mix until well blended. Divide batter between prepared pans; spread evenly.
6. Bake 30 to 35 minutes until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. 
7. Cool cakes in pans on wire racks 10 minutes. 

8. Meanwhile, prepare icing – I used a basic crusting buttercream icing.
9. Use icing as filling for cakes.
10. Crumb coat cakes and refrigerate for at least 20 minutes.
11. Cover cakes with fondant and stack up using dwell rods for support.
12. Decorate cakes and attach animals with royal icing and a piece of fondant.

Recipe found at Woman's Day - The Very Best Vanilla Cake