Sweet and Seven

Let's call this period of time "Ego Week".  It's actually 16 days to be accurate-- the day after Graham's birthday to the day before Cael's, during which time Graham is only one year younger and still riding the high of new presents.

For such a sensitive and sweet boy, he knows how to milk an advantage.



Graham's birthday is always a bit of a challenge.  When asked for gift ideas, he makes suggestions for cheap, meaningless items like "bubbles and balloons" or for things that don't exist, like "Nikes that are purple but say 'BOY' on them so people know they're not girl's shoes".  In short, it's up to me to find things that he will enjoy and make the experience special for him independent of the gifts themselves.

That was my biggest challenge this year.



I did get the bubbles and balloons.  I also got a some books and art stuff, a couple of small Lego sets, some fun bike accessories, and passed on a few ideas to my family.

And then it was time to make a cake.

You guys, I had the hardest time mustering up any motivation this year.  Perhaps it was because Graham had requested a Minecraft cake and I was not particularly excited or inspired by the subject matter, but from the moment I started baking, I just couldn't get invested, and that really hurt me in the long run.  Only Adler was really in the game.



All of the example photos on Pinterest looked largely the same, so I tried to copy my favorite parts from each and combine them into one confection, but my lackluster attention caused me to make a lot of mistakes, like attempting a square cake that was much larger and thinner than I expected and forcing me to bake three layers instead of two, using a whipped chocolate frosting instead of something firmer that would support the fondant, not making my own fondant and using dry store bought stuff, and just not caring sufficiently.  For the first time, I found myself wishing I'd just bought a grocery store cake.

To be fair, it was 3:30am and I had stared, unblinking, at the cake for 40 minutes without doing anything.  Eventually I stuck a creeper and a pig on it and gave up.



But my sweet Graham was so excited and grateful, despite the fact that he HAD to recognize it was not as detailed or as polished as I would normally expect.

And he loved his new shoes even though they were green, because his birthday was first.

Happy Birthday, Bubba.