Last week, in honour of our 1st Bloggiversary, we decided to make some sponge cakes for a pretend tea party. I must say that as far as my own kids go this has been one of the most popular crafts we’ve ever done. Miss R’s little friend, Miss B, came over to play and they all made a platter of cakes each.
They are a bit of a special one-off craft for us because it uses up a lot of materials in the one sitting, but the girls spent at least half an hour happily decorating their cakes, and I’m sure will spend many more playing with them so for us it’s definitely worth it. Here’s how we made them…
Getting ready for pretend play: You will need
• Sponges of various widths and colours. I used way too many and had a lot left over, but I suggest trying it with a packet of scourers, a few thin sponges, and a few thicker ones
• Tacky glue
• Felt for the icing
• Loose glitter (or glitter glue if you prefer), pom poms, sequins and sparkles to decorate
How To
Print out a copy of my squares and triangles template. I originally had circles as well as you can see in the picture but decided they were too time consuming and difficult to cut out, so stick to the squares and triangles for much easier cutting.
Hold the template over the sponge, and cut out with a sharp pair of scissors into little shapes. Repeat with the felt. I cut some of the left over sponge scraps into long “fingers” for making finger buns. The girls had a go at cutting out the shapes too, and enjoyed the sensory experience of cutting the sponge with scissors. Their shapes are a bit higgledy-piggledy and all different sizes but they thought they looked fantastic and we used them all anyway.
If you are using loose glitter like we did I recommend taking this activity outside – they will make a huge mess. Let the kids stick all the pieces together and decorate however they like, my kids and their friend had great fun doing this.
We used tacky glue because regular pva would not be strong enough to hold the pom poms onto the felt for long.
The girls were VERY generous with the glue and used plenty of it for every cake. We only had a small bottle of the tacky glue and they used the whole lot in one sitting.
Miss R’s delicious looking green sprinkle cake.
Miss K’s platter of golden glitter sponge cakes
The cake-decorating artist at work. We decided the cakes from all three girls were so gorgeous that they could definitely be cake decorators when they grow up.
Miss B’s beautiful creations.
Pretend Play with their glitter sponge cakes
The cakes dried well after only a few hours (amazing considering the amount of glue used, but boy was it a hot day!). The toys have been very spoiled with lots of lovely cakes and tea parties!
High tea anyone?
“Pretend play with these glitter sponge cakes offer an amazing array of experiences for any child in a fun, creative and imaginative way. So many skills are being developed from fine motor skills in using scissors, increasing focus having to be sitting down during the activity, communication in talking throughout activity, patience whilst waiting for the glue to dry and imagination in roleplaying. Yes it can get messy, there will be mess as children develop and learn over time the skills needed to create less of mess as they fine tune their fine motor skills as in learning to squeeze glue on gently. It all takes practice. Also inside a child’s young mind it is fun to glop glue all over the place. Messy play is also learning play, practising and learning skills that they will use beyond this activity in the real world.” Nathalie Brown
I’d like to know does your child enjoy arts and crafts? Can you remember if you enjoyed arts and crafts as a child?
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Congratulations on writing for Easy Peasy Kids Kate, and what a great craft to start off with!
Thank you Danya! So glad you like it
What a glorious craft for kids to be involved with and then able to play with their efforts and creations. Love the glitter sprinkles…we are going to have to try some of these, already have the sponges just waiting!
It is a great activity so much going on, Kate is avery clever lady x
They look fabulous… good enough to eat!! LOL
Exactly what I thought, I can make these better than any of my baking as that lacks presentation x
Now this is simple crafty awesomeness I can do!
Me too 🙂
They looks so real! But they are so simple!! Awesome!
aren’t they just fab x
These looks gorgeous and so tempting
and reusable 😉
That looks like so much fun! I wanted to jump in and make cakes too! Going to have to have a go of this ourselves. Thanks for sharing! I definitely remember liking arts and crafts as a child… and I still do! 🙂
they are such a fab activity 🙂
Oh I love these! Such a clever idea!