… my mind! So I decided that it was going to be a cake mix cake, even though I am quite capable of whipping up the labor-intensive kind. Yes, this blog post is seriously OT. Shhhhh, don’t tell tntlamb!
This week it’s my good friend’s and my husband’s birthday, you see, and, in keeping with my “feeling better” state, I decided that I should make and decorate birthday cakes.
Yesterday, I researched the aesthetics, with a little help from Google, of course. I decided on what the website said were “easy” butterfly cupcakes, seeing it’s summer and my friend loves birds and butterflies. I made the cupcakes last night, and set the alarm to get at the decorating this morning. That way, I could make the birthday delivery this afternoon. Easy? Easy the website said! Just some fruit jelly candy slices, cut up, and embellished with bits of licorice and some coloured icing. Piece of cake, right? After all, I was the teacher who used to have whole classes making gingerbread houses! (I must have been well and truly mad … but my memories are of such fun.)
Then, just for a bit of added excitement, I decided to use a new recipe for buttercream. A bit of a fiddle, but after beating the living daylights out of it, in the end it turned out all right. I frosted the cupcakes. So far so good. (And the licks of vanilla butter cream were VERY good.) Then it was time for the “easy” decorating. And I started cutting jelly fruits into butterfly wings. Too sticky! So out came a dish of sugar for the cut edges. Of course, then there was sugar everywhere! The wings got painstakingly “installed”. After that, it was time to tackle the weensy “feelers” sticking out of the butterfly heads. I cannot believe that I actually cut licorice shoelaces into fourths lengthwise … don’t ask! Then all I had to do was hold my breath and stick them in place without wrecking the frosting or the wings. Done. Exhale. And finally, a squiggle of decorating gel for the bug body. The butterfly cupcakes are cute, for sure, but by the time I had finished, I had cramps in my hands, icing up to my elbows, splatters everywhere from beating the frosting, and sugar on the kitchen floor. Two hours after starting, the finished product went into the fridge, and I went into the shower.
All cleaned up and dressed for a birthday delivery, I was just just heading out the door when I caught sight of the calendar. My friend’s birthday isn’t today at all. It’s tomorrow.