Happy 6th Birthday Maisie Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

Tomorrow my sweet little Maisie Miao Miao will turn six years old.  I totally can’t believe that she’ll be six because I swear that it was just a year ago when she was 14 months old and we first saw her sweet little cue ball cutie face.  To celebrate her birthday Maisie has had a number of parties.  First was Friday when she had cupcakes with her USA Level 3 gymnastics teammates and then Saturday morning another round of cupcakes with her TOPs teammates.  Two hours later on Saturday afternoon Maisie had her “big” little party of pottery painting with her girlfriends who aren’t on team or in school with her.  We have one more party scheduled for tomorrow with her classmates then the “Maisie is six” birthday parties will be over and she’ll officially be six!

For Maisie’s pottery painting party she requested a pink zebra cake so that’s what my little girl got.  

Maisie of course was a big help in making the Cream Cheese Frosting.

She was an even bigger help in taste testing the pink frosting.

Best of all she “cleaned” the mixer paddle for me.

Maisie supervised as I made and assembled the cake.

Crumb coat completed and Maisie “cleaned” the offset spatula, such a helpful little girl!

All the little cutie-patootie girls loved the pink zebra cake and everyone, including the adults thought it delicious.

I had tried to make the cake zebra patterned and I can see hints of the pattern but I realize now that I should have used more batter in each scoop as I made my layers as they were too thin as they spread so it ended up more marbled looking…oh well it was still delicious.  The cake was beautifully moist and the Cream Cheese Frosting was wonderfully delicious and not overly sweet, just perfect!  The recipe I used for the frosting is my go-to favorite and I have been making it for years.  It’s simple to make, works well for spreading and piping and everyone thinks it tastes like cheesecake, a real winning recipe.

Cream Cheese Frosting
4 8-oz. packages cream cheese, softened (I use regular full fat bricks of cream cheese)
1 cup salted butter, room temperature
1 TBS vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract 
4 cups confectioners sugar

In a stand mixer blend the cream cheese, butter and vanilla until smooth.  Add the confectioners sugar and on medium speed beat until smooth and fluffy.  Add gel icing color of your choice, if desired and blend.

Enjoy!

For the cake I totally cheated and used boxed cake mixes.   I used a 10x3-inch round pan so I used one box each of French Vanilla and Dark Chocolate Fudge cake mixes.  For the zebra top I used a Wilton sugar sheet which was simple and looked great.