but now ben's first birthday has actually arrived and that ideal party just seems like so much work for me that will really be for people other than ben. so a couple weeks ago, i started to attempt to bring down my personal expectations for beautifulness and started thinking about the most important part of the birthday: cake.
it's strange that we have been feeding this kid nothing unhealthy or sweet since he started solids yet on this random day, we're going to give him straight sugar in the form of icing. i'd read that a good idea for a first birthday is to use cream cheese icing and who doesn't love cream cheese icing? it seemed like a good idea. until tonight. i was planning to use my What to Expect in the First Year book's first birthday cake recipe. it has whole wheat flour. it has wheat germ. it has carrots and apple juice. it's healthy. "who's coming to this party that is going to want to eat this cake?" i thought to myself. but i already had my heart set on cream cheese icing and the only cake that goes with cream cheese icing is carrot cake. i like carrot cake (for the icing) and it's healthy, right? so i do some grocery shopping at 8pm and get making the cake at 9:15pm. and as i add each ingredient, it occurs to me that carrot cake is not healthy. in fact, it seems to be the least healthy cake i have ever made. "what the heck am i making this for?" i thought. and i quit grating the carrots. but then i thought of the cream cheese icing. i started grating the carrots again.
now the cake is baking. turns out that carrot cakes take about 45 minutes to bake. it's 10:15pm and my timer says i still have 22 minutes left. and if my baking reputation stands up, this cake probably won't be great. and since i left all other beautiful birthday party expectations behind, all i have is this cake. cake failure may produce a total meltdown. let's hope for the best. maybe i should make some cute party hats in the next 22 minutes to help let me down easy.
7 comments:
happy 1st birthday ben!
...and i'm sure your cake's gonna rock :) can't wait to see the pics!
Oh my word. I just came across your blog and I can totally relate to this post. My youngest son will be turning one in a few weeks and I, too, had dreams of a beautiful party. Now I`m starting to stress that this fantasy party won`t live up to my expectations...and I hear you on the cake thing too. Something about 12 months being the magic time to introduce your healthy baby to sugar...
Roxanne
So, how did the cake turn out?
If all else fails, call in the reinforcements, i.e. Judy MacD.
the cake turned out very well....a few un expected pb m&m's later, it was a great cake and a a great party. Well done mom. I'll let ben know when hes older.
I gave my baby 'chocolate pudding' on her 1st birthday (avocado, banana, cocoa and a bit of agave nectar). She LOVED it and it still made a mess (which really is what people want photos of). Then the guests got to eat the delicious, bad for us cake. :)
Wow that is quite the deal about cakes. I don't think I've ever actually baked a cake myself. I do know this though... You can in fact put cream cheese icing on many different types of cake - my family does it all the time and it tastes great! Especially with chocolate or caramel cake.
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