My cake obsession

It's become a tradition. An expectation. A challenge that I obsess over for 6+ months. The BIRTHDAY CAKE. For Paul's 2nd birthday it was Elmo (and the launching of this blog). I was told it couldn't be done. I am just not a cake person. HA. For his 3rd birthday it was a bulldozer. And thanks to an awesome design by Amy, another huge success. Soon after he turned 3, Paul begin to shift his sites from trucks to music. He wanted a guitar cake. I started sketching. Then one day he announced he would rather have a drum set cake. Not a drum cake, a DRUM SET cake. I searched google images. I tried to envision it. Paul began setting unrealistic parameters. Multiple drums. Silver cymbals. Blue icing. I refused to let that stop me. A few days ago we began the official paper link countdown. His excitement grew. My stress grew. How on Earth am I going to pull this off? Today, steps were taken. I stood in the cake aisle at Michael's and tried not to get completely overwhelmed. I finally started to visualize the drum set. My biggest dilemma - how on earth am I going to create something thin enough to look like a high hat, yet strong enough to not crumble into pieces when propped up?? how will I prop it up??? and make it silver??????
My ever so supportive husband's thoughts? "Are you going to go this nuts over the birthday cake EVERY YEAR??" ummmmmmm....