Birthday Cake vs. Birthday Cupcakes (or both?)

Since I've taken responsibility of the party, I'm trying to figure out if it makes more sense to get a cake or to go the cupcake route.  Luckily, I was able to contact an old high-school friend who has way more knowledge regarding the dessert options than I do.  My friend owns Desserts Divine and she was able to give me direction.  After discussing the intangibles with her, we've decided on going with a small cake for our son to be able to blow out some candles with and for the adults to be able to eat.  Additionally, we are going to have cupcakes for the little kids.  Eliana (of Desserts Divine) was actually able to provide some basic "pirate-themed" examples of how the desserts might look and I've posted the photos below.  Unfortunately, she said that there are no J&TNLP-themed cake toppers or decorations, so she will have to be creative with the cake and cupcakes.  I'm definitely looking forward to seeing what magic she can pull off! 

Jake and the Neverland Pirates Birthday Invite (Evolution of the Invitation)!

You can see from the images that I started with some screen shots that I took from the Disney Junior - Jake and The Never Land Pirates Website.  I took the Blank Pirate Map, a shot of the main characters and finally the main logo.  Since I do not have access to the latest and greatest Adobe Software, I used the resources that I had on hand, which consisted of a lot of copying and pasting by utilizing Microsoft Paint.  For the font I used Bradley Hand ITC.  For the wooden-looking number three, I simply cut and paste (and horizontally reversed) a letter "E" from the Jake and the Never Land Pirates Logo and then fattened it up a bit with Paint.  I personally think that it came out semi-decent, considering the lack of image altering software, as well as only investing two hours.

Jacob's Third Birthday Party!

Well, Kim and I had been racking our brains in trying to figure out what the theme of Jakey's 3rd Birthday Celebration would be (Cars 2, Thomas the Train, etc).  After much thought, we decided to go with Jake and the Never Land Pirates!  We have a location reserved and I will start to post the birthday activities and details shortly, including the invitation that I made by borrowing from various examples that I've found online.