A little on the wild side

I'm home sick today and thought I'd catch up a little on blogging. :) Today's subject: Diaper Cakes. I made the above diaper cake for my sister-in-law's baby shower. It had a jungle theme, so the white tiger was appropriate as the topper and I chose the ribbons to go along with him.

I thought I'd do this tutorial-like so I took lots of pics as I assembled it. Here's what you need:

1 base (I used a cake cardboard circle the same diameter as the cake covered in blue wrapping paper)
1 pole-like item to use as the center (I used an aerosol air freshener)
approx 60 size 1 diapers (newborn diapers usually are outgrown before the entire package is used)
at least 63 rubber bands in varying sizes
Gift wrap tissue paper or burp cloths (which I didn't use)
Toppers and other decorations (baby themed)
Ribbons

I first started by rolling up all of the diapers with the crease on the outside. (That's my dad's hands.) I secured each one with a small rubber band.

Next, I prepared the base and center and positioned one layer of diapers around the air freshener, securing the layer with a medium sized rubber band.

This is where the tissue paper comes in. You could wrap each diaper in tissue paper, giving the entire cake the appearance of being white, but since green was used so much in the jungle theme, I decided the leave the diapers as they were. I added two more layers of diapers to the bottom tier of the cake and secured each with a large rubber band.

Then I wrapped a wide ribbon around the bottom tier - covering the rubber bands - and taped the ends together. Then I tied a medium width ribbon around that and tied a tight knot

leaving tails so I would be able to tie a bow to them later.

The repeated these steps for the second tier of the cake, only using two layers instead of three.

Then I made two bows and tied them with the tails.

Finally, I used the remaining medium width ribbon to tie a bow around the tiger's neck and I set him on top of the cake. Success!