Cake Disasters...oh YEAH!!!

Yesterday was my husband's birthday. One more year closer to 30...eeek! He's getting old! I can't pick on him though because I'm six months behind him, so support is what he gets from me with a small side of chuckle.

He made it clear a while back that I shouldn't waste time searching for a present for him. Plus, he got the winch for his four wheeler not too long ago which qualifies as a birthday present. We also had an unwritten contract a while back that we weren't going to spend the $3-4 on a card because it's just a little up there for us. One thing I love about being married, being able to see eye to eye on things..budget cuts is one of them. Love it!

Even though our family is miles away and the friend population here right now is pretty slim, I still wanted to do a birthday hoo-rah for my man and make his special day, well, special. I woke up knowing that that I wanted to bake him a cake. He doesn't care for sweets thaaaaaat much, and store made cakes are over the top for him.

I'm not a baker and will never be one. I have always admired the pastry chefs on the Food Network that make whipping icing look like it was a natural movement. However, I am pretty good at figuring my way around the kitchen. So when I hit numerous bumps in the road on my way to getting this cake finished...I was at my whits end. Who knew so many things cold go wrong within a 30 minute time frame. Whew!!!

So here we go...the cake disaster extravaganza...

It all started with this little box of Jiffy Cake Mix.

My Moma has always used it and never had any problems, for what I know. I'm really not sure what happened with the batter. It was obviously water thin and it did not turn out like my non-baker mind imagined.

Yes....I followed the directions. Carefully.

My girls were napping and a trip to buy another box of mix was not an option. I found a recipe on line and got to work mixing from scratch. I mixed everything together, sprayed the pan, poured it in and as I was putting the pan in the oven, it hit me. I forgot  to add the baking powder. uggh! So I had to dump it out, mix that in, wash and respray the pan and do it all over. By now I was pooped.

I was beginning to feel like an octopus who's arms flail every which way doing all different things...yeah. My attempt was to get this all finished before Mike got home (which is always different). The cake topper still had to be made and a shower for me was still in thought. Anyhoo..

Things only get worse though. My clever idea to use my slightly old spring pan turned out not to be so clever. Come to find out it's spring has worn out and I am left with cake batter dripping all over my well seasoned pizza stone.

Don't mind my ugly-fied pizza stone. It's just well seasoned. Seriously!

(Do you leave yours in when you bake?) So here go the octopus arms grabbing another regular cake pan, spraying it down and dumping in the batter.

Oh I finally got things done. It came out pretty, out of the oven that is. Trying to do the flip-me-over routine didn't work so well. It stuck. I flustered. Almost cried. But managed to push through. My Aunt Shirley and Nana would be proud that I resorted to a home-made cake batter. They're masters at baking.

By the time Mike got home, the cake was in the fridge awaiting it's birthday debut. We got to work fixing his birthday supper because when you're a tag team of two, you're all each otehr has and that's how things get done...together.

Cheese steaks happened to be his meal of choice. His favorite. The ones he used to eat before we were married, kind. A side of french fries and some caramelized onions to top. He was happy!

The girls were cheery too because we let them dig into some cake for themselves. Talk a bout a hiper bunch of ladies in the latter evening. Woohoo!

All in all, the day wasn't total failure. The cake was enjoyed, the birthday boy was happy, and we added one more crazy and adventurous day to our "little family of four" album.

How do you celebrate birthdays when there is no family around? I'm always up for ideas, especially with the girls' 2nd birthday peeking around the corner.

Little Note: This recipe was teh bomb!!! It was sooooo good that it is now our family cake recipe. No more box mixes for this lady.