"Oh Look! Her Mama made her cake!"

Proverbs 22:7 The rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is a slave to the lender.

The Lego Movie party is inching its' way closer, and the budget hasn't grown a bit. I just finished our daughter's birthday cake and asked my husband how it looked. 

Silence. 

That's never a good sign. He shrugged his shoulders and said, "It looks like a birthday cake." Great. It looks homemade, I thought.

My goal was to save us a nice chunk of money on this party expense, but I hate sacrificing the adorable quotient. For her last birthday, I bought a super cute cake with Ariel and Flounder and Sebastian all decked out on a beach scene. That edible artwork cost more than $50! So this year I decided that was not happening! 

Here's what I spent on birthday cake:

$1.00 Yellow Cake Mix -on sale!

$1.00 Chocolate Cake Mix-on sale!

$3.00 Cream Cheese Icing- 2 containers on sale!

$1.50 Chocolate Icing-on sale!

$1.99 Round Cake Board

$2.00 Disposable Cake Pans

$1.00 Lego Stickers (I actually took them out of a book that cost $13.89 that I bought for her for a gift, but I was planning to give that to her anyway. I could find stickers online for about $1.00)

That's a grand total of $11.49! 

Compared to last year, I saved over $35 just on cake!

I borrowed a piping bag from a friend, hoping to achieve a more professional look, but professional equipment must be in the hands of a professional.  I am not a professional cake decorator. I am a cake decorating dummy.

Part of my mind is hearing the voices of other moms saying things like, "She's only going to turn six once, so you might as well make it special." That makes her Lego cake that I made seem inadequate. 

Though the ugliness of mom comparison is trying to steal my joy and convince me I am a sub-par parent because I am not purchasing a cake that is worthy of multiple-angle photos, a still small voice is encouraging me. "This is CAKE. We are going to EAT it. Cake is not something that has long-term value."

So with more resolve, I decide to feel confident about this feebly decorated cake. Yes, it looks homemade.  It saved us quite a bit of money, and my daughter thinks it looks amazing. It tastes delish too! ( sampled a bit of it!)

As I think about this cake, it is more a gift to my family than some kind of show piece for her guests. This is a gift to my kids, a gift of modeling responsible financial behavior. If we have the choice of spending $12 or $50+ on cake, will my kids want to take on the additional time commitment or the additional cost? This is a gift to my husband that allows him to have financial peace because he can trust me as a steward of the finances in our home. If we are worried about our budget, he feels additional stress. I want to create a home that allows him to sigh with relief when he comes home; I don't want to add any frustration to his already hectic day.

So, we will press six candles into this creation, light them on fire, and allow this child the opportunity to wish for something and then blowout the little flames. And then we will demolish the cake and consume all if its' carb-filled yumminess.

Financial Responsibility is my goal in this journey, and unfortunately, there are no exclusions for birthdays. If I want to teach my kids how to be financially responsible,  I have to show them how to do it everyday of the year. Though my husband and I are currently slaves to our lenders, my kids don't have to be! No cake is worthy of any debt!

Happy Birthday, baby girl!

For instructions on making the cake, click here.

Lego Birthday on a Budget

Making Lego Pops and Budgeting a Celebration

Our oldest child is turning six, and she wants to have a Lego Movie birthday party. Birthday parties can get expensive very quickly, but we cannot justify an elaborate, expensive party for each of our three kids every year. In previous years, I have been sucked into the idea of buying all the designer plates with matching cups, napkins, cupcake holders, banners, shirts, and trash can liners. Ok, so maybe they don't actually sell trash can liners, but I do think people might buy them. But we don't do that anymore! So I ask my kids what kind of party they want, spend some time cruising around Pinterest with them, select a few cool things to try to make together, and plan out a party on a conservative budget. These Lego head pops were an item that she liked the looks of, and I thought I could possible make them without breaking the bank for this year's party.

Lego Pops

I gathered the following items: 

a piece of foam

marshmallows

yellow melting wafers

lollipop sticks

black icing

clear lollipop wrappers 

small round candies

Begin by melting the yellow wafers in a double boiler. I bought my wafers in bulk from a bulk foods store. I did see a similar kind from a party supply store, but the cost was considerably higher by the pound. Since I am going for cost-savings, you can guess which ones I picked.

While the wafers are melting in your very slowly simmering double boiler, take the marshmallows and press the end of a lollipop stick into each one until it is stable.

These are just lollipop sticks that I got from the same bulk foods store. They have a lovely section with specialty items for cake decorating and baking. I could totally ruin our monthly budget in that store if I was left there too long. You'll be glad to know I got what I was looking for, and I got out! These 40 sticks cost about $2 for the pack.

Keep stirring your wafers until they are melted. In the mean time, gather your small round candies. I used candy-coated chocolates. If you choose to do the same thing, I suggest getting all yellow ones. I didn't have quite enough yellow and white candies to complete this task, so a few of mine have green or orange candies on top, and the colored wafer coating didn't cover them as nicely as I had hoped. These pieces become the little knob on top of the Lego character's head.

Here is what my wafers turned into after about seven or eight minutes of very gentle stirring in the upper portion of my double boiler with a gentle simmer below in the pan. It should be very smooth and easy to dip items.

Take your marshmallows one by one and dip them into the yellow candy coating. Tap it on the side of the dish to allow excess to drip back in to the pan.

From this point, you will need to take one of your candies and place it on the top. Add a small dollop of melted candy coating and swirl it around with a spoon until the coating and color looks uniform. The candy is going to want to slide around a bit, so you will need to be able to place this quickly into the styrofoam to allow it to dry upright and level.

Here is one that has just had the stick pressed into the foam.

I used a styrofoam ball because that's all I had on hand, and I didn't want to spend any more money, but a rectangular shaped piece would work much better! I had to shove a metal cookie cutter into the bottom of my round piece of foam to keep it from sliding all around. Even so, it tried to fall over a number of times during this process if I didn't keep the sides balanced. I think I had a couple of mini heart attacks  with each wobble! 

Once all of the pops are dipped in coating and their candy pieces are on top, put them in a cool place to set. If you can fit them in your refrigerator, this process will go faster. Once the coating is set, you can begin adding faces and a bit of personality to them. You will need a very small piping tip and black colored icing. This is a black gel that I got for around $2 already in a tube. You could save even more if you make your own icing, have your own piping bags and tips, and don't get frustrated with the process. I don't have quite enough coordination to use a piping bag yet, so I splurged for the $2 icing tube. I just sliced the end off and started adding facial features.

With each one, find a nice area on the marshmallow pop, and add two eyes. Next up is a mouth. Since this is a celebration, I only did smiles, but you can add any kind of expression you want.

Once their faces are on, place them back on the styrofoam holder and allow them to dry over night.

When morning comes, the faces should be set enough to package.

Here they all are. Don't they look happy? My kids were thoroughly impressed with these guys.

I added a clear cellophane wrapper and cinched it with a silver colored twist tie. These guys are ready to PARTY!

These little guys will be the favor for each child, and the whole process budget is below.

Lego Pops Cost Analysis:

$4.37 yellow wafers -(I have A LOT left over... I might use the left over for something at Easter)

$1.99 lollipop sticks- 40 count

$1.00 cellophane wraps and twist ties- 40 count

$1.19 marshmallows 

$0.59 round candies 

$1.99 black gel icing

__________________

$11.13 for 26 Lego Pops = $0.43 EACH!

So each child will get one of these as a parting gift for the party, and there's probably enough for many of the adults to snack on one too! I didn't get any of these items discounted or on sale or the cost would be even lower. I cannot justify spending several dollars per child or guest for a favor or parting gift; it's not in the budget. But these guys are fun and budget friendly, not to mention totally customized to work with our Lego Movie theme. I couldn't even purchase pre-made items like this from the store if I wanted to! 

Other Cost-Saving Measures

Invitations

I usually make some kind of cute (and borderline cheesy) invitation in the shape and size of a postcard to save on postage, and usually spend less than $10 total on invites and their postage. I keep an eye out year round for different types of paper and card stock that is on sale in stores or available at garage, yard, or estate sales. I always have a variety of types and colors of paper on hand that I got for a great price!

Cake

I push myself each year to find something cool and make it happen in the cake department; I plan to make a round, layered cake with Lego characters of the top, and in the interest of time and sanity, I will make a boxed cake mix extra jazzed up like this one.  If I purchased a bakery cake for about 35 people that would cost me more than $50! If I went with a professional chef that did super fancy creations, the sky is the limit for cost. I can usually make a nice layered and decorated cake for less than $10!

Decorations

Because my daughter has chosen such an unpopular theme and stores don't even carry items emblazoned with its' logo, I must be creative and make my own decorations. So far, I have built several items out of blocks.

First is the number 6 to decorate her food table. The castle creation will hold forks in the center as it has an opening designed to keep forks or other silverware held upright.

                           

I plan to make some other creations using Legos that we already own. I will probably even print some Happy Birthday banners as well. 

Celebration!

We want our children to feel special and to know that we celebrate their life each year at their birthday, but they know we have limited resources. Our kids love to be a part of the process of making things for their party. Instead of being completely surprised and overwhelmed on the day of their party, our kids look at their decorations and favors and know that their mom worked extra creatively to make things special instead of spending money that could be used instead to get our family out of debt.

Jeremiah 1:5 Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you...