Birthday – Staffordable Blog

How To: Throw A Retro 50’s Diner Themed Party

Transport back to the 50’s and host the ultimate retro diner themed party! I was first inspired to pick this theme for my party after visiting Daddy O Doughnuts– the cutest little retro doughnut shop just outside of downtown Toronto. After visiting there, all the ideas starting flowing, and the fun part of planning the flashback to the 50’s began!

Once I had the theme, I was pleasantly surprised to see how much I could do with it. I didn’t want to impose on my guests to have to put too much effort or money into their themed outfit, but still wanted them to have fun with it. With that being said, everyone gave it 110% and looked so amazing!

If you have followed along with any of my previous parties, you will have noticed that once the theme is picked, I pretty much go into full party planning mode. It starts with the colour theme all the way through to decorations and on-theme food and drinks. Right away I knew I wanted the classic aqua blue, pink, red, black, white, and of course checkered!

The fashion in the 50’s really looked like so much fun, and a lot of the old styles have come back. One quick look for an outfit at the mall made me realize how full skirts, polka dots, neck-ties and cat eye sunglasses were taking the shelves by storm, and I was allllll for it!

With that being said, it is usually the girls who are more into dressing up, and had more options when it comes to variation on 50’s inspired looks- I think us ladies killed it! The boys actually knocked it out of the park too with their James Dean digs and totally played the part of cool greasers.

Food is always an important part at any party and I had so much fun coming up with the menu. I kept it pretty simple with a major nod to classic diner grub. I went with sliders, fries, hot dogs (which were on a functioning hot dog roller), movie-theatre popcorn, fountain drinks, homemade soda floats and milkshakes, snow cones, cotton candy, and of course, all the retro-themed candy from that time that I could possibly find! I found the cutest red plastic baskets with the classic checkered paper liners in them along with condiment bottles at Party Packagers. I picked up the mini glass coke glasses that were 2 for $1 from the Dollar Tree and the float glasses from Bed Bath and Beyond. One search online and I found a ton of Coca Cola themed kitchen items, which ended up working out perfectly on the food table and really fit in with the theme.

The decor surrounding the rest of the party were old vinyl records lent to me from my grandma and my fiancé’s parents, it was really special to be able to have actual records from so long ago out on display! We also came across an old camera and camcorder when we were digging for records, and of course, no 50’s party is complete without an authentic turntable!

When I decided on this theme I instantly remembered this incredible old ’55 Chevy painting that my brother had in his room, and luckily after all these years he still had it. It was so cool to see that the headlights and taillights still light up too! I also made a backdrop that was designed to look like stools in a diner (I ordered the stickers on Amazon and added them to plastic table cloths), it was finished off with a plastic checkered table cloth. While I was looking online I also came across this 10-pack of cardboard cut-outs that I tied with fishing line and hung around the party. I kept costs down by building my own backdrop, most complete ones I saw were $50.00 and I made this one for around $15.0 total! It’s a fun for guests to take pictures in front of and was a huge part of the overall decor.

No birthday party is complete without a cake and this was definitely the centrepiece to my entire food table! I was lucky enough to have the creative mind of Sweet and Shy Cake Co. behind the amazing retro diner-themed cake. Check out Shay of Sweet and Shy Cake Co.’s Instagram for pics of all her sweet creations! I had given some ideas but really let her take the wheel on this one, and she did such an amazing job picking up on all the small details of the theme. Once we dug into the cake we were hit with this amazing orange creamsicle flavoured icing (talk about the icing on top of a cake). Such a small little detail did not go unnoticed and it was such a personal and thoughtful touch! I just loved the name banner at the top of the cake and could not have been happier with how it turned out .

Having help cut the cake HAHA

Cake c/o: Sweet and Shy Cake Co.

I am so grateful for all my friends who made it out through a terrible storm to come help me celebrate, and to my fiancé of course for helping me pull off yet another themed birthday bash (when will I be too old for this?! NEVER I SAY!)

This was one of my favourite themes to do yet, and I already can’t wait to start planning the next one!

Thanks for stopping in!

And of course, the super talented work on Facetime With Daniela for giving me the most flawless makeup ever (no filter required!) Check out her Instagram to follow along with all her luxury makeup artistry!

xoxo,

Sara

“The King of Cakes”…”Older Butweiser”

For Birthdays, Super Bowl parties, or beer lovers this beer mug cake is sure to be a crowd pleaser! (The Super Bowl is now only a few days away, this would be perfect to take to a potluck, and would be the talk of the party for sure!)

This is one of the most extravagant cakes I have made to date and once I figured out to construct it, it actually wasn’t too bad assembling and decorating. I’d LOVE to hear what you guys think of this and if you’d try it out yourself.

Pictured below is everything you will need to create this cake along with some helpful hints! 🙂

Your favourite cake mix and icing (any kind will work!) I went for white cake and white icing so I could easily dye the icing.
You’ll be making four 6″ round cakes (I made 2 extra just to be safe)
1 or 2 small baking tins (the container of icing is shown inside to depict the size). You can go bigger if you’d like but I found this to be the perfect size. This is Wilton brands smallest tin (I picked this up from Michaels $12.00 but got 40% off with a coupon!)
White fondant (I bought this thinking I might need it for the handle but I actually went with rice krispies covered in the same colour icing as the mug.) Either will work it’s all personal preference.
- Spatula to spread your icing
- Large tray of your choice
- Candy melts
- Balloon holder (long plastic yellow stick in picture) I got a pack of these for $1.00 from Dollarama
- Flower wire (I picked up a pack of these from Michaels for $4.00 and used three of them inside of the balloon holder)
- I used the top of the balloon holder and put it upside down and put some candy melts on the bottom to stick it to my tray
- Fool colouring “gels” It’s perfectly fine to use your everyday liquid food colouring but I bake a lot and this pack by Wilton I got on sale at Michaels and has a ton of colours! Again I used a 40% off coupon so I got the whole pack for around $12.00. You only need to use a little bit and they will last a really long time. The colours are great and it helps in not throwing off the consistency of your icing, etc.
- Piping bag with Wilton large round tip
- Buttercream icing (I used store-bought Wilton brand but you could make your own)

Steps:

Bake your four 6″ round cakes and LET COOL COMPLETELY!
Use a serrated knife so that your cakes are even when stacking
Lay the first layer on a plate. Add a small amount of frosting at the top just enough to go almost to the edges (don’t add too much or it will spew over the sides!)
Add your second and third layers (don’t forget to frost the top of each layer!)
I didn’t cut the top off my last layer as I knew I was going to be adding a lot of white icing to add the effect of foam so it helps if it’s already rounded!
Next I tinted my frosting. I had two different bowls of icing one for the beer mug and poured beer and I kept the other plain white for the foam. I used the “golden yellow” colour from my package of Wilton gel colours (I wish it would have turned out a little darker, next time I will mix it with other colours!) Just remember when mixing your colours to only add a little bit at a time and to mix all your icing at once so that the colour is consistent (it’s really hard to get the same colour twice when mixing more than one colour)
You can now use this colour to frost your entire cake! I used a Wilton spatula to help make it as smooth as possible but don’t worry to much about it being perfect! I didn’t frost the top of the cake with this colour as I knew I was going to be adding a lot of white foam bubbles with the white icing!
To make the “head” of the beer I used white frosting in a pastry bag with a coupler and a large round Wilton tip. This is where you don’t have to worry about it being perfect and actually the messier you are here the better affect you get! I ended up bringing some of the foam down the mug and onto my platter to add the affect of beer foaming out of its glass.
Next I stuck my balloon holder with flower wire right into the cake and then into the beer can. To help reinforce I turned the pop-tab on the top of the can so it was covering the hole in the can and this helped it hold really well!
I then iced the ballon holder with the same colour icing I used for the mug. Again, the messier you can be here the better result you will get! I had to keep repeating this step a couple of times until the icing hardened. I added some of this icing right up into the mouth of the can to make it look like it was coming out of it.
I moulded the rice krispies into a handle shape and covered this in the icing that I used for the mug. Using large toothpicks or skewers is best for holding them in place in the cake
Lastly I piped on some grey lines using the same round Wilton tip and some red icing to write Happy Birthday on my platter. This is where you can get creative and add a label to your mug and personalize it however you like!

THAT’S IT! It may seem like a lot of steps but once you get going it’s really not too bad! Now that I know exactly how to make it, I know the next time I make it it will go even more smoothly! I PROMISE you that everyone will love this cake and you WILL get lots of questions about the illusion of the floating can (it’s AWESOME!)

Tag: Birthday

How To: Throw A Retro 50’s Diner Themed Party

Pouring Beer Mug Cake

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