Castle Cake

January is cake time in our family. My youngest has a birthday and we have fun making elaborate cakes. For his 4th birthday he asked for a castle cake with a princess coming out of it. Thought you'd like to see the 7-tower castle cake we made as a result.

We built the towers with cake and upside down ice cream cones. The doors and windows were made of fruit roll-ups snipped into shape with scissors. The moat was blue paper with a pretzel drawbridge.

Beware - making this cake takes lots of cake batter. The main castle base was built with two square cakes stacked on top of each other. Then I baked another rectangular cake and cut it into smaller pieces, plus made a few cupcakes for smaller tower pieces. I ended up baking extra cake along the way to finish all the towers.

And this January?  He's asked for a pirate ship cake.

What cool cakes have you ever seen or created? Any tips for making a pirate ship?