When All Else Fails, Make A Trifle

Several days ago, I saw this wonderful recipe on The Food Network by Giada De Laurentiis called Strawberry and Mascarpone Filled Cupcakes. Originally I thought I would make it for Adam as a surprise because he LOVES strawberries! He suggested that I wait and make the recipe for Easter because we were going to have dinner with his family.
I always tweak recipes, so I decided to take the recipe for cupcakes and make it into a cake instead. Also, instead of mascarpone cheese, which is expensive and hard to find, I substituted cream cheese and a little whipping cream. The cream cheese/whipping cream substitution worked very well; however, my decision to make a layer cake instead of cupcakes was something short of a disaster. Strike that - it was a disaster! My cake literally looked like a 4 year-old decided to bake a cake!! I am no 'top chef', but I can make cakes better than that!
I was so upset about the cake, with mere hours before Easter dinner. Adam told me to take the cake anyway because no one would care about how it looked. He suggested saying that the cat made it! I really didn't have time to make another one, but I was seriously thinking about it. Finally I decided to not take the cake to dinner, so I cut a piece to eat, and it tasted like a little piece of Strawberry Heaven! I felt bad about not taking such a awesome tasting cake, so when all else fails - make a trifle!
I cut the cake up in pieces, made more strawberry filling and added cool whip to the top and Viola - a Trifle was born!
Here is the original recipe. I suggest sticking to the directions, except the mascarpone cheese!