On baking wild cake

Life has been a blur. Just like this picture. The earth is in the sky, and who knows where or when the particles will settle. The wind is, if anything, persistent. So here we are, wild as Wednesday. And it comes once a week. You know, it gives me a star to which to aim at.

So life is a blur and time marchy march. I am hectic and nuts. Life hands me wild moments all the day through. I bull doze through like this:

The most wild thing to happen to me this week is my wee Wild-Nevadan-in-Training has turned five. This was like graduation for me.

I remember those first days and months when I handled him so carefully. I remember when rogue germs terrified my every being. And, when I was driven to pack something into every single pocket of the diaper bag, no matter how short the errand.

Five years later my heart swells. It was a major accomplishement.

But, as you know, things went wild:

The fifth birthday came with the responsibility of baking a birthday cake and 25 cupcakes... Baking being outside my realm of talents, I bulldozed into the project with good intentions. I was pretending confidence, but worry sprinkles were floating in the air. Even in the begining it seemed a recipe for disaster.

Somehow I made it through the entire baking process without a mishap. And, the cupcakes turned out pretty good even after I frosted them.

While the cake was cooling and while the boys bathed I went to check on it and found the crust layer of the top partially gone.

Hm. It looked like somebody stuck a lid to the top of the cake and pulled it off and some of the warm cake stuck. It also looked like maybe the cat had come along and skimmed off a layer. About 1/3 of the surface area had been comprimised.
At this point, I have baked three boxes of cupcakes (with filling) and frosted 25 cupcakes and baked one cake, and I am not in the mood for any more of it. After I think about it for a while I decide I will just frost the living crap out of the birthday cake and pretend nothing happened. This is when, aparently, my Karma starts rolling.

So I frost and sparsely decorate the cake before anyone sees it; and because cake decorating is also outside my realm of talents I keep it simple. With little candies it says "5." Big woopie. And, as I finish it up I feel a little guilty about this little cover up I now have going. Well, then some motherly activity calls my attention away, and again I leave the cake unsupervised and uncovered on the counter.

Brilliance. These are the moments that make me feel proud I kept my son alive for five years and I deserve some kind of graduation recognition...but I digress.

Maybe 15 minutes later I remember the cake, and rush to the kitchen to find the cat in the actual act of  licking the frosting off the cake. Seriously?

I tuck that cake in the cold oven to protect it from the cat and kids while I am at work. I am trying to figure out what to do. So, I say nothing to the rest of the family. I mean, hell, if it is the same cat and the same kitty germs I already frosted then what is it going to hurt if the cat added a few more?

Sadly, that is not even the end of my Wild Wednesday story. When my Hon gives me a ride at lunch-time that day, he says he has run into trouble with the birthday cake. He tells me that he pre-heated the oven for a pizza. And, the rolling smoke alerted him to an almost-disaster. There is terror in my eyes.

"It's not too bad." he tells me.

When I get home I find the frosting is melted down into the sides of the cake dish. The five I was so careful with, now looks like a five in one of those Internet password protection prompts. It is smushy.

Now, this is where most mothers would dump the cake that cannot go right, and go down to the store and see if they can find a replacement cake for their five-year-old son. On that particular day I was a bit too busy. I was trying to catch the dust particles loose in the atmosphere. Mostly the ones that came with the birthday. The bubbles and water guns. And, there were no less than four water guns!

You probably already know what Heathen Heidi did with that cake. But, in my defense let me say maybe it was because they acted as if they could not hear me when I tried to herd their squirting bubble party to the out of doors? Or maybe it was because they did not say anything about the smelty cake, and I was too tired from catching dust particles to consider plan B.

Yes. I did it. I let them eat a piece of the kitty germified, smelty cake, after a hearty birthday song. Just like there was nothing wrong. Ha! So you also may have guessed there is just no birthday cake pictures this year!

Bad mom? Well, lets just say while time marchy marchy and my son grew from defensless infant to a sturdy five-year-old Wild-Nevadan-in-Training, this mom has evolved too. Into what I am not always sure. But, wild is Wednesday. Happy Hump Day.

Loves,
HjB