Preheat oven to 170 °Celsius.

Beat butter and sugar till soft and creamy for about 2 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.

In a separate bowl, sift flour, baking powder, and salt. Fold in the sifted ingredients into the creamed mixture alternately with milk, starting and ending with flour.

Remove cakes from oven and let them cool completely before icing and decorating.

You can make the bow in advance. Add some CMC to the fondant so that the bow sets firm. Follow this tutorial to make the bow.

In making the bow, use the stainless steel bowl used to bake the semi-circle cake (i.e. Minnie's head) as a guide so that once set, the bow could fit well on Minnie Mouse’s head.

Before cutting the name plaque, prepare a paper template to guide with the size.

Start by cutting out all the letters required for the birthday person's name from the paper template. Arrange the name on a large sheet of paper and glue them to it.

Next, draw an outline around the name, leaving about 1 inch margin all around.

Cut the paper following the outline. This will be the template for the name plaque.

Next, add some CMC powder into black fondant and knead well. Roll the fondant thin and place the plaque template on it. Cut it out.

Rest the cut plaque on the sides of a 9 inches round dummy so that the plaque sets in that curved shape.

To make the pink lettering, use the earlier font printout as a guide to form each letter. Insert a small circle disc into the extruder tool and pipe out long strips of pink fondant. Guide the strip by hand to follow the shape of the letters on the template. Where there are joints or connections, use fondant glue to secure them. Once all the letters are completed, leave them aside to set a little. And then, slowly lift them and arrange them on the name plaque which is still on the cake dummy.

Once you are satisfied with the position of the letters, carefully apply fondant glue to the bottom of each letter and attach them to the name plaque. Let the plaque with the letters on it to set and dry completely.

Add some CMC to some black fondant. Knead well and roll it.

Use a round cookie cutter to cut out 2 circles. Insert a lollipop stick into each of the black circles. Let the circles set completely before using on the cake. It is better to make the ears one day in advance so that they get to set properly before being used on the cake.

Once the baked cakes have completely cooled down, level the tops.

For the 7 inches round cake, fill the layers with buttercream and crumb coat the whole cake tier with buttercream.

Repeat the crumb coat process for the bowl shaped cake tier.

Next, cover the bottom tier cake with pink fondant. Roll some white fondant and use the round plunger cutter to cut out the white dots for the cake. Attach these cut outs randomly on the pink fondant covered cake later.

As for Minnie Mouse’s head, cover it in black fondant. And then tier construct it on the base cake (with bubble straws). After that, attach the borders for both cake tiers, with black strip for the top cake tier and pink strip for the bottom tier.

Next to go on the cake is the fondant plaque. Since it is rather heavy, making it stand upright without any support will be quite hard. Support the front of the plaque with a strip of white fondant at the base. And then add 2 layers of the fondant strip at the back of it. Use fondant glue to hold all the components together. While waiting for the glue to set completely, support the plaque . I used my food coloring bottles. I arranged them in a row, on the front and back so that the plaque sets straight.

Once the plaque is stable, complete Minnie Mouse’s head by poking her ears into place and gluing the bow. Attach the bow with fondant glue. The fact that Minnie Mouse’s ears were at the back will make it easier to attach the bow as the ears help to support the bow while the glue dries.

Finally, cut out tiny flowers in pink fondant. Attach them to the cake board, at the back of the cake. And while the fondant is still soft, poke the candles into the center of each flower.