I think dressing your kids up Anne Geddes style was pretty dumb too, but whatever.
When I was a kid we didn't get any cake...we got a pile of dirt on our birthdays! And we liked it!
and we walked 10 miles in the snow to get it!
Southerncross you are on a roll today 
That baby is adorable.
All my kids had smash cakes that I made for their birthdays. I can't think of a single 1st birthday party I've ever attended and there wasn't one. Wal-Mart gives you one for free if you order your kid's 1st birthday cake from them. The only beef I have with smash cakes is the clean up afterwards. Unless they aren't my kids, then I encourage them to rub cake and icing in their hair 
Trash the dress is a new one for me though. I couldn't imagine doing that to my wedding dress. But then again, mine has been sitting in storage for a decade now and hasn't seen the light of day since I had it packed away a few days after the wedding.
I think dressing your kids up Anne Geddes style was pretty dumb too, but whatever.
When I was a kid we didn't get any cake...we got a pile of dirt on our birthdays! And we liked it!
and we walked 10 miles in the snow to get it!
Fighting off polar bears with your loose leaf notebook Oh wait, that was how my mom used to describe her walk to school each morning.
^#$%@! Now I gotta stop my campaign to shut down Pinterest and Etsy.
Traci-doodle wins.
Well said, traci_doodle, well said.
$60 for several cakes BAHAHA !! i would have said you do mean $60 a piece ! of course that photog probably thinks its just cake right !
I think dressing your kids up Anne Geddes style was pretty dumb too, but whatever.
When I was a kid we didn't get any cake...we got a pile of dirt on our birthdays! And we liked it!
and we walked 10 miles in the snow to get it!
Fighting off polar bears with your BARE FEET is more like it
(sorry I couldn't resist)
As kids we got our choice of birthday cake guaranteed to be made from a mix, iced but not decorated or garnished with much...and we knew how lucky we were to be given that choice. The babies liked cake and got it in little nibbles on a baby spoon or as cut-up chunks to be eaten with fingers.
The look on babies faces at the wonder of that first taste still makes for some of the very best pictures you could ever want to take. Giving it to them in little bits doesn't seem to spoil the fun. No need to make a mess to get some once-in-a-lifetime images.
Some people don't care for the whole smash cake thing, I don't think there's anything wrong with that.
I don't like it either. If people want to do it, go for it! I just personally don't really care for it, and didn't get one for my daughter's first birthday.
[quote="southerncross"]One baker's cute is another's foolish quirk. and 20 years does not a "tradition" make....craze, fad, caprice perhaps...but not tradition.
Something done by YOUR family anually is a tradition, no one said it was a national tradition. Believe me letting a child dig into his cake on his first bday has been going on for more than 20 years. I'm 48 and I know that I was allowed to dig into my firsth bday cake before anyone else. But I really don't think this anything to be getting our panties in a bunch about.
Thank you, paulstonia. Thank you. That's exactly how I feel.
In my family, on their first bday the kids were always allowed to dig into the cake first. I first became an aunt at 12 so I can remember all my nieces and nephews doing this, cute photo op. Of course my kids did too. I thinks it's more a tradition (ok, not one everyone may be familiar with) than the down fall of society. I think a small cake for the child so everyone doesn't eat cake their hands have been in is cute. I make them to match the big cake for 1st bdays, kind of like getting the top tier on a wedding cake at no charge to save for anniversary. The photographer thing, I don't know, always thought of it as a candid thing, but $60 for a day full of cakes wouldn't happen because of the $ not because of what they were doing to my cakes,lol.
I completely agree! I became an aunt at 11 and I remember my first niece just going to town on her slice of cake. We didn't do actual smash cakes yet then. But she was adorable with cake all over her face. Luckily, some did make it into her mouth. My other niece however just put her fingers in the icing and played a little with it. She didn't have as much interest.
I've done a few first birthday cakes with a three-tiered cake and a small matching smash cake for the kiddo. I think its a great idea. We usually do them in a white or yellow-vanilla cake and whipped icing. That way, its not too sweet for a little one.
Now the whole $60 thing is redic! I think the smash cake is just personal opinion but the pricing just sucks. I would charge my normal fee and would ONLY discount if the photographer did this on a regular basis and always used you as the baker.
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