Birthday Burnout!

So this weekend was my mother’s 60th birthday. We gave her a Caribbean themed party at Bahama Breeze restaurant. My sister flew in from Reno and I thank God for her—for more reasons than this—because she helped me get this party together.

We had lots of running around, lots of supplies to buy and then it was wrapping thank you gifts, which were dessert tartlets, and baking the birthday cake.

Then it was left to me to deal with the birthday cake, mainly because I volunteered like an idiot. A few years ago, I took a class in cake decorating and while I learned some neat tricks, I am far from becoming any competition for Duff at Charm City Cakes. I was SO stressed out by this cake.

People have said to me that I should get business cards to advertise my cakes, and then they take my refusal as a lack of motivation or some kind of inability to do better for myself—yes, people have actually said stuff like that to me.

Well, I used to go into the explanation that baking cakes is stressful, time consuming, expensive and can easily become a disaster in a pan. I also used to explain how my passion is writing, how I can sit and write for hours and hours and not be bothered by that one bit. If baking/decorating a cake took that long, I would be PISSED!

Don’t get me wrong, I like baking cakes, it can be fun and creative, but I like it better when it’s few and far in between. So now, when people ask why I don’t have business cards, or why I don’t bake cakes for a living, or that I’m stupid for not cashing in on a talent I have, I simply say…I’m a writer.

Most times that answer still makes them scratch their heads. Writing isn’t something they can see in front of them like a nice fluffy cake so it’s still sounds like a pipe dream. Most will still try to convince me that with their help and all the people they know, I could live nice and comfortable selling my cakes.

It used to annoy me, but it doesn’t bother me anymore. If there is one thing I am, it’s confident in who I am and that’s a writer, not a baker. Can I be both? Yup, but I’d rather be a writer who bakes sometimes.

So now that I’ve ranted, lol, here’s a pic of the cake I made for my mother.


EDIT: It was brought to my attention that the cake looks flat. So I found a better pic below! They almost don't even look like the same cake-lol

MIA

Wow, it’s been a while since I’ve updated. Life has been a bit busy, what with vacation (HOT azz Reno) and just being summer. I think I’ll be back in the swing of things next week. My birthday is Monday, and I plan to go to Boordy Vineyards tomorrow to have some wine, tour the vineyard and relax with friends. The band playing is a British invasion band so I’m thinking Beetles tributes are in my future. Hope they’ll be good, but I’d wager after my third glass of wine, they may be the best darn band in the world.

Some people think this sounds sad, but I’m making my own b-day cake—lol. I’m not really making my own cake. One of my best friends’ birthday is the same day, and she’ll be at the vineyard too, so I’m kinda making it for her. But the real reason I’m making my own cake is because I was watching this show called The Oprah Effect. They featured this cake company called We Take the Cake. Well they have this cake called a key lime cake. It looked so good that I’m going to try to make it! There isn’t a location near me, and I don’t have time to order one from them…besides, I fashion myself a pretty good baker. I’ll let you know how it turns out.

To round off my b-day weekend, some friends and I are heading to Annapolis on Sunday to have brunch at a restaurant called Buddies. They have the best buffet, and I don’t even like buffets! Then we’ll walk by the water and look at all the shops…that is, if it’s not an ungodly rain like it’s been for the past few days.

Now, I’m off to watch a few more episodes of Supernatural, do a fangirl squee over Jensen Ackles, and then head off to bed.