Castle

• A castle cake would make a fairy or medieval adventure party complete. To make a castle using giant cupcakes, you will need four full cupcakes and an extra base. Layer one giant cupcake on top of the extra base, and arrange the cupcakes in a diamond pattern, with the taller cupcake at the back. Decorate the bases of the cupcakes with doors and windows, and top the cupcakes with small flags made from toothpicks and construction paper. Use your child's favorite colors for the icing and flags. Add frosting flowers and bushes around the base of the castle.

Gingerbread House

• For an easy alternative to the traditional gingerbread house, use a giant cupcake instead of forming the house from rectangles of gingerbread. Use a spice cake for the cupcake and decorate with candies as you would for an old-fashioned gingerbread house. A house made from a giant cupcake won't fall over if the kids try to use too many candies, which will make this activity less frustrating for the younger ones than gingerbread, which is prone to collapsing.

Barnyard

• Make a barnyard cake for a party for an animal-loving child. Frost the bottom of the giant cupcake red and add black windows with white edges. For the roof of the barn, frost the top white. Using a flat pastry tip, pipe white shingles onto the top. With yellow frosting and a narrow round pastry tip, pipe hay piles in the windows and around the base of the barn. If you can find it, yellow edible Easter grass is an easy alternative to frosting hay piles.

  Of course, a barnyard needs animals. Decorate regular-size cupcakes as barnyard animals. Using colored fondant, shape heads, tails and legs for animals, such as pigs, cows and horses. Let these heads dry at least 24 hours before attaching them to the cupcakes. For an easy alternative to animal cupcakes, use animal crackers.

Kids Decorate

• Let your kids decorate the giant cupcake as a party activity. Put a base layer of frosting on the cake yourself. Give aprons to the kids to protect their clothes. You may also want to lay plastic under the work area to protect your floor and cover the table with a plastic tablecloth. Set out a few pastry bags filled with different colors of frosting and some bowls of candy and sprinkles. Then step back and allow the kids to have fun.