Preheat oven to 350°F. Spray three 8-inch diameter round cake pans with nonstick spray and line the bottoms with parchment paper. Set aside for the moment. Mix the milk, egg whites, almond extract, and vanilla extract in a small bowl.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Rub/cut in the butter until the mixture looks like wet sand. Add 1/2 the milk mixture and stir. Then add the second half of the milk mixture and stir.

Divide the cake batter into 3 bowls (about 1 1/2 cups batter per bowl). Add 2 drops pink food coloring to one bowl, add 2 drops yellow food coloring to another bowl, and add 2 drops blue food coloring to the last bowl.

Pour the three cake batters into the three previously prepared cake pans. Place the pans in the oven and bake for 20 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Let cakes cool in the pans about 10 minutes, then flip the cakes onto cooling racks and let totally cool to room temperature.

Cream the butter. Mix in 3 cups of powdered sugar. Add the milk, vanilla extract, and almond extract. Then if necessary, mix in more powdered sugar, adding it 1/4 cup at a time until you reach desired consistency. Now frost your cake as indicated in instructions below.

After the cake layers are stacked and the crumb coat is done, tint the remaining frosting with green food coloring and use that for the final layer of frosting.

Frosting the Cake

pink, blue, yellow cake layers

white and green vanilla frosting

cake board

Slice each cake layer in half lengthwise so you end up with two thin pink layers, two thin blue layers, and two thin yellow layers.

Place a blue layer down on a cake board (or like me, use a cardboard circle, cut out from a cereal box, and cover it in foil).

Add a dollop of vanilla frosting.

Smooth out the frosting.

Cover with a yellow cake layer.

Frost.

Add a pink layer and frost.

Repeat until last pink layer is stacked.

Cover the whole cake with a thin layer of frosting for the crumb coat. Refrigerate cake 15 minutes for the crumb coat to harden. Then frost the outside of the cake with the green frosting.

Decorate the cake with cotton candy truffula trees and The Lorax decoration (instructions for both below). Bagged cotton candy can harden once exposed to air, so wait until you're ready to serve the cake to make them, or keep each tree top (the cotton candy portion) covered in plastic wrap after making it.

The Lorax Decoration (optional)

white, yellow, orange candy melts

semisweet chocolate

black food coloring pen