You don't have to be an expert cake decorator in order to make fantastic looking birthday cakes. Here are some cake decorating ideas to help you to make your cakes extra special that do not require exceptional cake decorating skills.

First, determine a theme for your cake. If the cake is for an adult, what are the likes, hobbies or interests of the birthday person? For example, if the person likes to fish, make a fishing theme cake. If the person likes to golf, make a golf theme cake. If they like to play the guitar, make a guitar cake.

You could also make the cake theme match their profession as well. For example, for a mail carrier make a mail theme cake or for a carpenter, make a carpenter theme cake.

If you are making a cake for a child, have it match the theme of the party or the child's favorite character, interest or even sport.

You get the idea, just try to make the cake extra special for the birthday person by making it match their hobbies or interests.

A really easy cake decorating idea for making these theme cakes is to purchase cake toppers that match your theme to place on top of your cake. These come in many different varieties. However, if you happen to want to make a certain theme cake for which you cannot find a cake topper to match, try the miniature section of any hobby or craft store.

For the examples above, you can purchase things such as a miniature fishing rod and net for the fishing cake, a miniature golf bag and golf clubs for the golf theme cake and a miniature guitar for the guitar cake. You can then place them on top of your cake. For a mail theme cake, purchase miniature mail boxes and make little letters out of card stock that you laminate and place them on the top and sides of your cake. For the carpenter theme cake, put miniature saws and other tools on the top of or on the sides of the cake.

These are just a few examples. The ideas really are endless, but hopefully this has helped to get you started thinking of different and unique cake decorating ideas that will make the next cake that you make extra special.