The ‘wild wood’ party actually took place a rather humiliatingly long time ago. Back in the dark days of November the ‘blue’one turned the almighty age of 6. It’s such cliche to say it, but where does the time go? I look at the photo taken of him on the day he was born and can’t quite believe we are 6 years down the line, reading, writing, hating maths and wanting to give up school for Lent – genius idea but totally impractical! This birthday we decided to go solo and organize the party ourselves. From the parties I had been to recently, the most fun,  most laughter and most enjoyment seemed to be from those where the parents were really actively involved. Mr.P embraced the brief and got ordering, oh the joys of online shopping and I got baking! Walter had decreed a ‘Wild Wood’ party would be the order of the day and a decree went out.

It was a pretty nippy November day but nothing to stop some serious camp building, bonfires and bangers. Toasting marshmallows was understandably very popular nothing quite beats ramming a fat one on a long stick and plunging it into the fire; as was alot of running around and stopping the enemy from ambushing the camp. When fingers started cooling down we moved to the archery arena (what could possible go wrong – after all we were only of in the company  16 five to six year olds). Thankfully arrows were kept away from eyes and tea was soon on the menu. I can’t say I have become any more adventurous in this department since when I first started cooking my little peoples birthday party teas. There are without any shadow of doubt some firm favorites, and low and behold the blue one certainly was not going to deviate from them now! Bangers, baby burgers, the age defying hula hoop crisps, a smattering of cucumber and carrots, but basically it was bread and meat, sandwiches and baps!

I had deliberately decided on this birthday to make the cake simple. How easy would it be to create a replica of an archery board? Oh simple is not the word. One round cake with 4 different rounds of icing, oh the joy would not be lost on me. No swearing in the kitchen and no hours spent icing some masterpiece. Oops – that plan went out the window when I stupidly double checked the cake choice with said ‘blue’ boy. Huge mistake, massive mistake, monumental mistake. In no time at all he had grabbed my ipad and was scrolling through the ‘Robin Hood’ – ‘Wild wood’ cake creations liberally and callously out for all to see on pininterest and google images. I was clearly in for the high jump! In no time he had selected the cake of his desire and I was left speechless as to how to reincarnate it. After the initial panic subsided I realised I could just about pull it off. The sponge tree trunk I made with 3 x 10 inch sponge cake rounds. I used the Konditer and Cook recipe for chocolate curly wurly cake, as this is deemed in our family to be the best chocolate cake recipe of all time. I sandwiched the trunk together with butter icing and then iced the top, I then covered the whole trunk with fondant icing to create the spreading parts of the trunk and bark. A wonderful fluted piping bag saved my bacon when it came to icing on the bark and a few leaf cutters pulled off the woodland effect. Now clearly the size of everything is slightly out, but you know what, it had the desired effect and the ‘blue’ one adored it. Curiously it was not that difficult to make and just goes to show you don’t know until you try, something I commonly tell my children yet rarely implement myself!