The Saga of the Cake

Jul 28, 2007

so we were going to throw this surprise anniversary party for Ray and Kathy.  It was recently their 25th anniversary, and we think that deserves a party.

 

So we (Calvin, me, Kelly and Nikki, Kevin and Stacey) resolve to have this party.

We pick a date, a place, a menu and buy some decorations...all that good stuff.

I think it would be nice to have a cake.  A wedding cake.  Well, okay, an Anniversary Cake...but that's mostly the same thing.  Same cake, different topper. Right?

 

and I, in my brilliant innocence (innocent brilliance???), decide to get the cake from the Slaton Bakery because as we ALL know, Slaton Bakery is West Texas' best kept secret, and their cakes are to DIE for.  Honestly, best cake ever.

 

So we drive over to Slaton, and pick out a cake. It's well after this point that the logistics of transporting a wedding cake 100 miles on a July afternoon make me go 'hmmmm'.  But you know what?  I have a big truck.  There's room to sit the cake.  There's an air conditioner vent in the back of the truck.  No biggie.  Right?

 

right.

So we pick up the cake, and off we go.  Air conditioner blasting the whole way.  Rock was in the back seat asleep under a blanket.  I couldn't feel my toes.  But the cake was doing fine.

We got to Odessa, and stopped (for five minutes) at Nanny's house to get some pictures.  It might have taken us a little more than five minutes.  We MEANT to stop for five minutes.  Maybe it was thirty minutes.  I don't know.

 

What i do know, is when we went back to the truck, I looked through the back window to see how the cake was doing.  the cake was doing fine....just fine.

 

the icing, unfortunately, was not doing so good.  The icing was mostly melted, laying in these big mushy heaps around the bottom of the cake.  There was a lot of bare cake looking back at me through that window.  Bare cake that was just screaming "WHY DID  YOU LEAVE ME ALONE IN THE CAR?!?!?!!? YOU KNOW THAT ISN'T GOOD!"

But hey, we all make mistakes.  Right?  Maybe not with cakes that are that expensive, but it's not like I left my dog in the car while I went shopping or something. Come on... But I was not in a good mood after that. I was pretty damn cranky, to tell you the truth. But Calvin made a few calls and found a bakery that was willing (not excited, but willing) to redecorate the cake. so we drove across town to the bakery, and this very nice woman scraped away all the melted icing and redid the sides of the cake with brand new icing that looked just like it was supposed to look.

 

yeah, the icing on the sides of the cake looked great. Of course, this is about the time when I notice that the roses on the cake have changed colors.  ??  Um, those roses were purple when we left home, I KNOW they were. The bakery lady says "yeah, buttercream will fade....."

so now the cake has blue roses instead of purple roses.  Okay.  Deep breath.  I can live with that.  Honestly, they're a very lovely shade of blue. they are still a little purple down at the base, and then they turn blue, and it's actually really pretty.

but THEN I notice that the roses on the top layer of the cake did NOT change colors.  so now the top layer has purple roses, and the bottom layer has blue roses?

 

Well, maybe nobody will notice?  Maybe? 

the cake tasted good.  That's the important part.  Right?  Tasted wonderful.  :)

 

And it's the thought that counts.  Right?

 

there are pictures....but you have to promise not to laugh.  I might think this is funny in about forty years.