Vitafamiliae

Somewhere in the middle of our Thanksgiving holiday, we pulled off a birthday party.  Which meant that, the day after hosting a houseful of lovely, hungry people for Thanksgiving, I had to make a cake.  And you people know I can’t just “make a cake.”  I have to make a cake.

I was short on time, creativity, and energy.  And, fortunately, Willa’s expectations weren’t very high.  She had no idea why I was shoving beaters covered with cake batter in her face, but she didn’t mind.

She didn’t mind one bit.

She got wise to my tricks, though, by the time I got around to making the Nutella flavored filling for in between cake layers.  She grunted and squealed at me in between bites.  And if I didn’t get the spatula back to her face fast enough, she began beating her chest wildly to sign “please please please please please please.”

And then our crowd of people arrived.

How cute is that brother of mine, huh?

This cake may have been my best-tasting yet, what with all the filling and such, but it was a bit of a visual disaster.  Half of it started to slide and break before I even got it iced.  It went from being a typical 8-inch round to a 10-inch slope.  Since we made some chocolate butterflies to go on top, we dubbed it Butterfly Hill.

Willa had no idea what to think when we surrounded her with singing and fire.

But it took no time at all for her to grasp the ramifications of The Icing.

And just because I live in fear that one day my kids are going to come to me and say, “You never really had birthday parties, Mom, you just stuck us in the same high chair, gave us cake, and claimed there were people there,” here’s proof there was a roomful of Willa’s Loved Ones.

Since her party was on Saturday, we had to make the leftover cake last to her actual birthday on Monday.  This involved a great deal of self-control on my part.  And Willa’s.  I had to hide the cake because any time she laid eyes on it, she started squealing and “pleasing” like crazy.  I managed to scrounge up one last piece of cake for our birthday girl to enjoy on her actual birthday morning, just like my mama taught me.

She may never eat oatmeal again…