How to Make a Layered Styrofoam Birthday Cake

At my church when the children have a birthday we give them a little something. Several years ago I saw someone use a fake birthday cake at their church. In January I decided to try and recreate it. Because the children range from ages 3 to 12, I bought a variety of pens, pencils and crayons to use as candles on the cake. The children enjoy deciding which "candle" they want for their birthday present. By far the sword pens have been the biggest hit. I ordered the pens, crayons, and pencils through Oriental Trading to kept the cost down. This layered Styrofoam birthday cake could be used by school teachers, church groups, or anyone.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Styrofoam discs--6 discs, get double of 3 different sizes
• hot glue gun
• hot glue sticks
• Ruffled bulletin board border/trimmer
• Pens, pencils, &/or crayons
• Permanent marker

1. 
    

   Plug in your hot glue gun and make sure to have extra hot glue sticks nearby.

2. 
    

   Here is a visual picture of the 3 different sizes of Styrofoam discs you could purchase.

3. Take the largest Styrofoam discs and glue the two together. For example if you are using discs with a diameter of 6, 9, and 12, glue the two 12 inch diameter disc together.

4. Now glue the middle size discs together.

5. Finally glue the smallest diameter discs together. Allow the glue to cool completely between all 3 of the discs you've put together before you proceed.

6. Once the glue is hardened so the discs won't shift, it's time to glue the ruffled bulletin board border onto each layer of the cake. The border represents the frosting on the cake. So the border will be taller than the 2 glued discs.

7. Put the border on by lining up the flat edge of the border to the bottom of the side of the Styrofoam discs.

8. After each group of discs have their sides covered with the border you can glue the 3 discs on top of each other in order of biggest on the bottom, smallest on the top. Be sure to line up the spot where the border connects on all 3 disc. This way the front of your cake won't have any of the lines where the border connected.

9. 
    

   Now that your cake is made. Take the permanent marker and write "Happy Birthday" on the front of the cake

10. 
     
    top aerial view of the cake

    The final step is to put on the "candles". Oriental trading has a wide selection of pens, crayons, and pencils to choose from for your "candles". Space your candles out proportionally on each layer of the cake.

Tips & Warnings

• Offer a variety of writing utensils. Make sure you have some that both boys and girls will like.
• When you need to restock the candles on the cake, make sure you put the new candle in the same hole so your project will last longer and remain proportional.
• You could spray paint the top of each of the disc before you glue the 3 layers together.
• If you are using a high temp glue gun, you will still feel the heat through even a 1 inch thick disc so be careful.

Resources

• Oriental Trading Company

[Alishamitchum]

on 8/14/2009 very cute!

[dorigillman]

on 7/25/2009 cute idea. kids will love this!

[westernmom]

on 7/16/2009 What a great idea! I'm going to post this on my Facebook page. Thanks for sharing with us. 5*