Diaper Cake

I am attending a baby shower tomorrow and I really wanted to make a diaper cake! I recieved one at my church baby shower and loved it. The ladies at my church are really so talented. For shower gifts I've learned how to make a diaper cake and a diaper wreath from them (plan on seeing the diaper wreath in a few months as I hope on making one for Fitness-Mom to take when I visit her in the hospital!)

This was my first attempt at a diaper cake and I think it turned out really well! I wanted to share with you how to make one too!

What you need:

1. empty paper towel roll 
2.  60 diapers (I used size 2 Huggies)
3. 3 sizes of rubber bands (thin ones to wrap around diapers, medium and large thick ones for holding the cake together)

When rolling up the diaper's make sure you roll from the top so the when your done you see the nice smooth edge of the bottom fold instead of a bunch of ruffly edges. Secure with rubber band.
Here is my newborn helper Alison showing a newly rolled diaper:

The first thing you need to do is fill your paper towel roll. Do this by rolling three diapers and shoving down into the tube. The third one should be sticking out the top a little.
Then start building the base:

You want to build the base by first wrapping 7 diapers around the tube (all diapers have been rolled and secured except for the ones I used inside the tube). Use the thick rubber band to secure to tube. The next layer of the base is 12 diapers, use the meduim thick rubber band to secure:

And then the last layer of the base is 18 rolled diapers also with the medium thick band to hold.

To add the next layer put the rubber band around previous layer and then just add the diapers to it.

For the second tier of the cake add two layers of diapers. 1st layer 7 diapers and 2nd layer 13 diapers.

The top tier is 7 diapers and the boring part is almost over! Turn the diapers so the folds face inward (in the picture you clearly notice the ones that the fold is readily visible). And the final fun step to the diaper cake is decorate!

Wrap ribbon around the cake to hide the rubber bands. I added fake flowers and then of course little gifts. I added a St. Jude teddy bear (they donate a few dollars for reasearch!) a snuggle dog blanket, 4 jumpers (rolled up and tied together with blue 'bundle of joy' ribbon), 2 wooden cars and a rubber duck. I fastened the ribbon with tape and everything else with ribbon wire.

Here is the back of the cake:

Sorry the pictures are so dark, it's night and our house relies heavily on the California sun for illumination!