When I was a girl, my mother made the most amazing birthday cakes for us, amazing confections of cake and sugar.\u00a0 It was, for me, a part of the definition of motherhood.\u00a0 Moms make dinner, say prayers, love you, make spectacular cakes.<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t make amazing cakes.\u00a0 In fact, I\u2019ve made very few birthday cakes for my children at all.\u00a0 Our local grocery store does a good job, they\u2019re cheap, and I\u2019m too scared to do it.\u00a0 In my chicken-hearted defense, I\u2019ve attempted cakes in the past and it has always been catastrophic.<\/p>\n
When my first child turned one, I made the new mommy mistake of throwing a giant extravaganza in our small house.\u00a0 We invited 40 people for a dinner I was determined to cook with a cake I would expertly whip together.\u00a0 I finished the caked the morning of the party, and it was darn cute.\u00a0 It was Winnie-the-Pooh.\u00a0 It melted 2 hours before the party.\u00a0 The heat of the kitchen from dinner for 40 turned that darling cake into a pile of chocolate soggy glop. <\/p>\n
When she turned 4, I screwed up my courage to try it again.\u00a0 She wanted a princess tea party.\u00a0 I made petit fours.\u00a0 Four dozen pink, purple and white individually iced cakes.\u00a0 I was the best mommy ever.\u00a0 The best husband ever helped me to clean the kitchen before all the tiny princesses arrived.\u00a0 In order to wipe down the counters, he moved my platter of cakelets to the top of the refrigerator. \u00a0 Did you know it gets hot up there?\u00a0 Neither did he.\u00a0 Chocolate soggy glop.<\/p>\n
I swore to never make another cake for a special occasion.\u00a0 Cupcakes for friends?\u00a0 Sure.\u00a0 Cake for dessert?\u00a0 No problem.\u00a0 Birthday cake? Forget it.\u00a0 I\u2019m under the birthday cake curse.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
#4 turned 6 this week.\u00a0 (Her birthday post will be up tomorrow) All she wanted was a rainbow cake.\u00a0 She found a picture in one of those mommy magazines that lay around my house.\u00a0 We took the picture to the grocery store.\u00a0 They said they don\u2019t make that kind of cake.\u00a0 We went to the bakery.\u00a0 They wanted enough money to feed a small family for 2 weeks.\u00a0 She looked at me with teary eyes and said, \u201cYou can do it, Mommy.\u00a0 I know you can do it if only you try.\u201d<\/p>\n
It took two days to try. Four layers. One each of pink, yellow, green, and blue.\u00a0 A towering confection of cake iced in sky blue with clouds and a bright yellow sun.\u00a0 A brilliant blue summer sky with a rainbow on the inside.\u00a0 It was exactly what my daughter wanted, and a triumph for me.<\/p>\n
I took a thousand pictures and couldn\u2019t wait to post them here, to brag about my accomplishment.\u00a0 There is just one problem.\u00a0 I can\u2019t find the camera cord, so I can\u2019t upload the pictures.\u00a0 They are sitting in my camera unable to be shared.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
I made a gorgeous cake.\u00a0 I can\u2019t show it to anyone.\u00a0 The curse continues\u2026\u2026<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When I was a girl, my mother made the most amazing birthday cakes for us, amazing confections of cake and sugar.\u00a0 It was, for me, a part of the definition of motherhood.\u00a0 Moms make dinner, say prayers, love you, make spectacular cakes. I don\u2019t make amazing cakes.\u00a0 In fact, I\u2019ve made very few birthday cakes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1979,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-864","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n