Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Line three, 8″ round pans and two 6" round pans with parchment paper. Grease and flour the sides (I use baking PAM for this).

Use a mixer with paddle attachment to beat together water, sour cream, oil, extracts and egg whites until well combined.

In a separate bowl, whisk together cake mix, flour, sugar, and salt.

Turn mixer to low. Slow beat cake/flour mixture into sour cream/egg mixture.

Beat on low for 3-4 minutes. Some lumps will remain.

Divide batter into 3 bowls. 1/4 of the batter should go into one small bowl and remaining batter should be divided evenly between two medium sized bowls. Use blue food coloring to color batter in smaller bowl until desired color is reached. Use red food coloring to color batter in one of the larger bowl until desired color is reached. Leave the third bowl white.

Pour blue batter into one of the prepared 8" pans. Pour 2/3 of red batter into one of the 8" pans and the remaining 1/3 into one of the 6" pans. Pour 2/3 of white batter into the final 8" pan and the remaining 1/3 into the remaining 6" pan.

Bake for 23-28 minutes, or until toothpick inserted into center of cake comes out with just a few crumbs. The thicker cakes will take 25-28 minutes while the smaller cakes will take 23-25 minutes. I put them all in at the same time and check after 23 minutes

Cool cakes in pans for at least 5 minutes, then remove to racks to finish cooling. Let cool completely before assembling.

Thaw raspberries and strain juice from berries. For this step I put a large strainer over a bowl and let the berries thaw in the strainer.

Add enough water to the juice in the bowl so that you have 3/4 cup of liquid.

Combine juice mixture with sugar, lemon juice, and cornstarch in a small saucepan. Cook over medium heat, whisking constantly, until mixture thickens. Once mixture thickens, remove from heat and set aside.

Place the raspberries in a mesh strainer. Place strainer over bowl and press berries with spoon so that pulp falls into a bowl. Strain until you have 1/2 cup of pulp.

Once the mixture in the saucepan has cooled, add the raspberry pulp and raspberry liqueur. Stir well. Transfer to airtight contained and place in refrigerate for at least 3 hours before using.

Place butter and shortening in bowl of stand mixer fitted with paddle attachment. Beat on medium-high speed until mixture is smooth and has lightened in color.

Add vanilla and sea salt. Mix until well combined.

Divide frosting into 3 bowls. Place 1/4 of frosting into one bowl and mix in blue food coloring until desired shade is reached. Place 1/4 of frosting into a second bowl and mix in red food coloring until desired shade is reached. Place remaining 1/2 of frosting into final bowl, you will leave this white.

Use sugar cookie recipe to make sugar cookies, and cut into stars. If you don't want to make sugar cookies, you could use store bought dough and decorate with the royal frosting. I much prefer the homemade though!

Once cakes have cooled completely, level tops of all cakes. Use a cake leveler or knife to cut 8" red cake, 8" white cake in half (you will then have 4 thin 8" cakes).

Place one the 8" red layers on a 10" cake board. Use red frosting to pipe a border along the outside edge of the top of the cake. Fill inside the border with half of the raspberry filling.

Place an 8" white layer on top of the raspberry filling. Cover layer with white frosting (I used a pasty bag with Wilton tip #12 for this).

Repeat with next red layer/remaining raspberry filling. Place final white layer on top of this, but do not cover with white frosting. Place red 6" cake on center of white layer. With a Wilton tip #12, use blue frosting to pipe around the red layer. Then place blue layer on top of blue frosting.

Place final 6" white layer inside of blue layer. For whichever layer is shorter, use corresponding color frosting to raise height to that of taller layer. My white was taller than my blue, so I used blue frosting to pipe on top of the blue cake so that the frosting was the same height as the white cake.

Divide your white, blue, and red frostings into three pastry bags. Use a Wilton #12, or similar round tip for all of the bags. Start at the bottom of the cake and pipe around the red layer with red frosting, the white layer with the white frosting, etc. Use the blue to color around the blue layer at the top. For the top of the cake pipe around the blue with blue and the middle white with white.

Use Ateco frosting smoother, or something similar, to go around outside of cake. Just holding the smoother while going around the cake will cause the colors to blend together beautifully. Wipe off the smoother and use it for the top of the cake as well.

Use the white frosting with the Wilton #12 tip to pipe 8 evenly spaced mounds on the top of the cake. Place a star cookie into each mound. You can also place mounds in the center for a larger cookie as well.

Change the frosting tip to a Wilton #21, or similar star tip, and pipe stars along the bottom outside of the cake.

Use sprinkles to decorate further as desired!