When Things Don't Work

Today I had to bake a cake. I had a cake order for a cake for 50+ people.

 Chocolate cake, layers of cherry filling, white chocolate buttercream and marzipan smoothed over it all. 

Sounds lovely doesn't it? 

The day seemed to be looking good when I woke up before my 3 kids and my husband was to work second shift. 

My 2 year old nearly always wakes up crabby and clingy. Today was no exception. Neither of my toddlers would eat breakfast and my baby was fussy. 

By 9 a.m it was already 86 degrees- the hottest day we have had this summer- not a good day for decorating a cake. 

I finally got my two year old dressed in her swimsuit-nothing else will do for her. I decided just to let her have her nuk sippie cup/bottle. I try not to give it to her- she is already 2 years and 2 months old. BUT today I needed anything to keep her happy and quiet. 

I had my first layers of the cake baking. My 4 year old was working outside with Daddy. My 2 year old was playing with baby toys and things were looking up. WHEN, my two 2 year old fell on the step outside and scraped her leg. It was nasty- about 3-4 inches long and 2 inches wide. GREAT! We used all the band aids in the house (remember to write those on the list) on it- 2 normal size ones, 2 little ones, and a round one. Whew, good thing she thinks band aids make everything better. 

She kept taking little rests on the bed. I kept filling her bottle on request and she kept guzzling milk. I kept reminding myself tomorrow we can do things more normally. I just HAVE to get this cake done. By noon she had drank at least 4 bottles and was running to the potty all the time- thankfully no accidents while indoors. But still this makes a lot of interruptions for mom. 

Here I am trying to bake cakes, keep the laundry going (gotta make use of the sunshine), get my baby to sleep and keep my toddlers happy and out of the way. 

Snacks, today we used lots of those! Prayers, lots said too. Praises, keep everyone optimistic with lots of good words. 

At 11 a.m. my husband had to leave for work. By this time I was feeling ready to pull my hair out. My babysitter is on vacation and I had no one to ask to help me with the kids so I could work on the cake.

No one, except God.  Good thing he never walks out on us! I realized what my husband COULD do since he couldn't be at home. I told him he could bring home lunch so I would not have to stop baking to cook (he eats at home everyday). 

Things starting calming down about noon and my baby was dozing. By 12:30 I had the cake baked and the kids were nicely playing. About 13:00 I made the cherry filling for the cake and started on the buttercream. 

I was so happy when my husband did indeed bring home lunch. Wow, good man, thanks! We had a lovely lunch and I was able to get the kids to bed pretty easily. Thanks, LORD! 

The afternoon went more smoothly and I was happy to be ready to roll the marzipan by early afternoon. 

Marzipan is fun to work with is small quanities- but it is hard to put over a cake and make perfect. I took it off the 10 inch cake 3 times. I got sooooooooooooooooo frustrated and hot that finally I had to go and take a dip in the kiddie pool. 

Somewhere in the middle of the afternoon we had a huge storm. My four year old was saying, "Please rain go away." Cute, I let him come downstairs since he wasn't sleeping. We watched the storm- until it got REALLY windy here and the rain and wind were blowing horizontally. Scary! We were both so happy when it passed. 

A few more trials and problems and the cake was finished.Whew, what a relief!

I hope they liked it.