Squeezing in a little sweetness for Skye

Lemonade is a whole look, not just a flavor. Yellow and white stripes, a paper straw, a lemon on the side. Skye's cake leans into all of it.

Two tiers doing two different jobs

The bottom tier is stripes — yellow and white running vertically all the way around, like the awning over a lemonade stand. Stripes are the fiddly part of a cake like this. They have to be even in width and they have to meet properly at the back, and a cake is round, so there's no cheating it with a ruler.

The top tier is the quiet one: pale yellow, with lemon slices piped onto it in white. Each one is a wheel of little segments, done freehand.

Pearl borders in white run along the top and bottom of both tiers and tie the two looks together.

The bit that makes it

A lemon, sculpted out of fondant and sitting on top like it was just set down there. It's the detail that makes people realise the whole thing is a lemonade stand rather than just a yellow cake. A striped paper straw goes in beside it, and a couple of fondant lemon wedges tuck into the tiers.

What's inside

Vanilla cake with vanilla buttercream frosting.

Worth saying, because everybody assumes lemon when they see this cake. The lemonade is the look. Underneath it's plain vanilla, which is what Skye wanted.

Happy birthday, Skye

Squeezing in a little sweetness.