The answer is always YES

When my daughter was a baby, and Ace of Cakes was on TV, I decided I needed to learn to decorate cakes. So I took a class at Michaels and learned how to pipe and make a buttercream rose. I made some birthday cakes, and then somebody asked me to do her wedding cake.

What she said was, "Do you do wedding cakes?" The answer was yes. Of course I do!

So I did.

A little later, when my cousin sent me this photo and asked if I could do it, the answer was yes.

Of course I can.

 In reality I had no idea how to do this:

Or this:

But that didn't stop me from doing this:

The year handmade scarves were all the rage, I'd never crocheted or knitted a stitch in my life.

That didn't stop me from gifting handmade scarves to everybody on my Christmas list.

The word "can't" was never allowed in my house growing up. My dad told me once, "There's no such thing as can't. There's will or won't. So either look me in the eye and say that you won't, or quit whining and do it."

Can I run a business, even though I've never taken a business class? Yes.

Can I write a novel in 30 days? Yes.

Can I do whatever it is your Marketing Manager or Content Wizard or Social Media Guru needs to do? Yes.

If it can be done, I can do it. And if it can't be done, well...we'll see about that.

Rainbows and Unicorns: The best. Party. Ever.

So, the lovely Ilana over at Mommy Shorts is wondering if it's possible to have a themed birthday party without selling your soul to Elmo. Whether it's possible to dive headfirst into themed birthday goodness and still be awesome. I'm here to tell her it is.

The Princess has had birthday parties featuring Blue's Clues, Tinkerbell, and Fancy Nancy. I've featured some of those cakes in a past post (that post also, weirdly, features Ilana and Mommy Shorts. I don't only blog about her, I promise. That would be creepy, right? Ilana? Would that creep you out? It would, right? OK I'll find another topic). 

Today I'm going to share with you the greatest little girl party theme of all time: Unicorns and Rainbows.

I'm starting with the best part: rainbow cupcakes.
Those are sour Airheads, if you were wondering (you know you were). Simple, adorable

Unicorns. And rainbows.

Rainbow gumdrops.

Unicorn coloring table. I just Googled "unicorn coloring pages" and printed out a bunch.
I do this for pretty much every single birthday party I throw.
Cheapest craft project ever and the kids love it.

The birthday girl and her BFF.

Eating jelly beans! And coloring! And eating jelly beans!
(Also? Did I mention? JELLY BEANS!)
(It's common knowledge that unicorns love jelly beans.)

The cupcakes on their stand. Should have probably dressed up the stand a little.

A little free play time.

"See? This is the unicorn's horn. You throw the ring on the horn."

That's one way to do it.

Pin the horn on the unicorn party game. Bought it at Oriental Trading, I believe.

I won't name names, but #7 cheated.

Present time!

New skirt from Ashley. Handmade, of course. But hey, I'm no slouch myself!
I made that Unicorn ring toss, OK?  I found a picture I liked online and used a projector to blow it up and trace it on butcher paper, glued the paper to cardboard, and painted in the colors. Then I cut it out and taped a wooden dowel to the back (all the way up the horn for reinforcement). The dowel is then shoved into a styrofoam block which is in turn shoved into a Christmas tree stand.
I know. Brilliant.

My husband made the t-shirt. It's an iron-on transfer. The kind made for dark fabric.
He found the rainbow and unicorn separately and Photoshopped them together for the perfect image.
He then meticulously cut that image out with an Xacto knife. I know.
She still wears it constantly.

To whomever bought her this game (yes I've forgotten, this was MONTHS ago, ok?), she loves it.
She really does.
I'm the one who isn't a fan. But I play it anyway.
Because I'm an awesome mother.
(An even more awesome mother would have covered that Christmas tree stand with something pretty.)

It's...a DOUBLE RAINBOW.
(Oh, you knew it was coming.)

I wish this one still had the candy rainbow on top, it's such a great photo otherwise.

Oh, go on and hit your "Pin It" button. You know you want to.

How writing is like cake decorating.

Just read this and got inspired.  "Are the Rules of Writing Killing Your Creativity?" by Asrai Devin.

The rules of writing include all those "do-nots."  Don't overwrite.  Don't overtell.  Avoid purple prose.  Stop describing things that don't matter.  Get to the meat.  YES.  This is all important.  But this is not how creativity works!  Here is the line that hit me hardest:

"It's hard to go back and add details.  You lose the voice of the story."

YES.

And that's the key.  The rules of writing are really the rules of editing!  And you cannot edit what you have not written!

I've mentioned before that I've been known to decorate cakes.  Here is one of the cardinal rules of cake decorating, the rule that ensures your buttercream is satin smooth with no lumps and cracks and inconsistencies, no unsightly cake crumbs marring its surface:

Start with way too much icing.  

After the first application of icing, only remove, never add.  Never.  Add.  More.  Icing.  Only remove the excess until you're left with perfection.  And if you don't add enough excess in the first place, you're screwed.  So you have to really pile it on thick.  Lots and lots of icing has to go on that cake, icing that you know full well is just going to come right back off.  But it has to be there!  It serves a purpose!

And it works.

And that's how writing works, too.

And that's why NaNoWriMo works.

These 30 days are your first application of icing.  The dumping.  The huge scoop, scraping the entire bowl of icing onto the top of your cake, leaving nothing behind, never worrying that it's too much.  Dump it all.  Write everything.  Write the nonsense.  Write the garbage.  Write all the possibilities, every ounce of plot, story, character development, overanalyzation.  Put it all down.  Because you cannot go back and add substance later, not really, not consistently.  You'll end up with cake crumbs marring the surface of your cake.  You'll end up losing the voice of the story.  All you should be doing in draft two is removing.

Or, as Stephen King put it in his book On Writing:  "2nd draft = 1st draft - 10%."

Only removing.  Never adding.

But before you can remove?  Before you can edit and whittle and shape and carve and smooth it down to perfection?  You have to DUMP.  Empty out the bowl on top of your cake and leave nothing behind.

I need to go write now.

Karma Cupcakes.

If you aren't following me on Twitter (or were, you know, sleeping last night), here's what you missed:

That link leads to my post entitled "Humiliation and volunteerism. Also Girl Scouts don't eat cookies."  You may want to check it out before you continue.  And I'm not just fishing for clicks here, ok?  It's actually relevant.  And entertaining.  We'll wait.

Yes, Girl Scout leader suggested cupcakes.  I was relieved at first until I realized that instead of one big Girl Scout daisy, I now have to make 48 tiny Girl Scout daisies.  Doh.
Why do I always think cupcakes are easier??  They're not.

Buy one get one FREE, you guys.  It was clearly a sign.

The highlight of my night.  Who am I kidding?  The highlight of my week.

Oh yeah.  NaNoWriMo started yesterday.  Without me.

Twitter finally responded to my cries for help.
And no, they do not have fewer calories.  But I plan on telling Nike Mom they do.

Thanks, Mom.

This is important because I was making all the little daisy pieces out of fondant, and without white I couldn't make any colors other than the pre-colored red and blue I had on hand...which leads to some really poor imitations of the Girl Scout daisy.

Just for reference, this is what the Girl Scout daisy is supposed to look like.  Remember this for later:

Another link back to the Humiliation and volunteerism post.
Because seriously, if you haven't read that, none of this makes any sense.
Possibly none of this makes sense even if you have.  I was up really late last night, ok?

AAAARRRRGHHH!!!

And...there goes my plan to make up for the humiliation of putting my daughter's Girl Scout membership on layaway by providing a super awesome cake for Founder's Day.

The good news?  They will never ask me to do this ever again.

Here's a closer shot, just so you can really see the full wreckiness.  Sorry for the terrible photography, I was pretty much over it last night:

OK.  Now my pride requires me to show you these, to erase those cupcakes from your memory and prove I'm legit:

I made this.

I made this.

I made this.

Whew.  I wonder if it would be weird to print these photos out and distribute them at the Girl Scout Founder's Day party?

Humiliation and volunteerism. Also Girl Scouts don't eat cookies.

So.  Girl Scouts.  Right?  Yeah.  We're Girl Scouts now.

I was in charge of snack yesterday.  I brought bananas and a box of Halloween sugar cookies.  Because it's the last meeting before Halloween, I wanted to be festive.  But you know what?  I kind of got the impression some of the other moms were...less than pleased about the cookies?  Maybe I was being paranoid.  But some of them were like, loudly, "You can bring that cookie home and have it after dinner."

Good grief, people.  I brought bananas.  They all happily ate their bananas.  Your kid can't have one single cookie at 4:00 in the afternoon at a Girl Scout meeting?  I mean, I'm kind of all about healthy snacks.  The Princess basically eats nothing between meals but fruit and veggies, period.  So I'm ok with a random cookie every now and then at a somewhat special occasion like a Girl Scout meeting.

Does anybody else find it somewhat ironic that cookies are not welcome at a Girl Scout meeting?

Oh, also?  This happened:

So.  Basically everybody at Girl Scouts is healthier and better-looking than me.  Got it.

Also?  Richer.  OK, we recently moved, and it was kind of an insanely expensive experience fraught with unexpected costs.  Then we had to buy 8 new tires because both cars decided to become death traps in the same month.  Whatever.  These months happen, right?  Well, we joined Girl Scouts in the middle of this, and while I'm told Girl Scouts will never cost us a penny ever again, ever, because cookie sales (cookies, people!) are so very lucrative that the Girl Scout experience is self-supporting...there is a little bit of a start-up cost.  Registration fee, dues, uniform...all told close to $80.  Fine.  I get that, things cost money, and I'm fine with it, and we can afford it.  Except...um...not this month.

The Girl Scout leader acted basically cool about it.  I said I'd pay next month, she didn't give me any grief.  But you know, I can pretty much read minds, and I just know she's judging me.  My inner monologue is something like this:  She thinks I'm lying, she thinks I'm going to keep showing up here with my freeloading kid and our evil unhealthy cookies and soak up the activities and take the patches and never pay a penny.  I'm like the Wimpy of the Girl Scouts.  And why are these women so pretty?!  That one did not give birth to that child.  No way.  They're all staring at me, they know I haven't paid the dues, and I don't own anything made by Nike, and I never stretch or drink enough water.

I will gladly pay you Tuesday for character-building enrichment activities today.

OK.  So at the end of the meeting they announce that we'll be having a "Founder's Day" celebration next month, with cake and snacks, a whole party.  Moms are asked to email the leader and let her know if we can bring fruit or pretzels.  Meanwhile I'm spending the whole meeting trying to avoid said leader so we don't have to address the money issue yet again because she never remembers that I said November 1, I can pay on November 1!

So I sort of sneak out the back door at the end of the meeting, avoiding eye contact.  That night I get an email from the leader:

Hey! I forgot to ask you today. Do you have the money for dues, registration, and the tunic? Just let me know what you can do. Thanks!

AAAARRRGH!! The horror.  I mean, do you see the judgement in those lines?

My response:

Sorry! I meant to talk to you too. [this is a lie] 

Ok here's the deal. We just moved to town in August. It turned out to be a very expensive move... lots of unforeseen costs that we're still trying to recover from. I fully intended to pay all of this on October 2nd, then Princess was sick [so we missed that meeting]... and now by this point in the month we're broke again! Ugh. I swear this is not our usual situation. It's just a weird transition period we're in from moving. 

So. Payday is the first of the month and I will absolutely pay everything we owe at the next meeting, November 2. Alternatively I'd be happy to give you a check tomorrow postdated for November 1. I'm so so sorry that I can't do better than that right now. It's embarrassing, honestly. Lol. I PROMISE I don't usually do stuff like this. Thank you so much for letting Princess still be part of the group. Once we get past this weirdness we'll be model scouts!

Also- I'm a cake decorator, so I wanted to see if you needed a cake donated for founders day? I could do some kind of girl scout themed sheet cake if you want. Otherwise just put me down for pretzels or fruit, whichever you still need. 

Thank you for everything! Princess is a little shy at first but she's loving Daisies and I know she'll open up soon.
Alyssa

Sigh.  Ramble much?

And can we just examine that second-to-last paragraph?  "I'm a cake decorator, so I wanted to see if you needed a cake donated"???  "I could do some kind of girl scout themed..."  WHAT??

People, yes, I have been known to decorate cakes.  Wedding cakes, even.  But I have formally announced to the world that I am taking a break because between my kids and my job and my house and my writing I just cannot handle it.  They became a chore, they became a source of absolute frustration and misery for me.  I do not decorate cakes.  I hate cakes.  

So yeah.  "I can decorate a cake for you, for free!  Totally!  You in no way asked me to do this and I would've been fine just buying a bag of pretzels at the grocery store but let me speak up and volunteer to cover the humiliation of putting my daughter's Girl Scout membership on layaway, OK?  Let's just forget that whole money thing and HEY, I'LL MAKE A DESIGNER CUSTOM GIRL SCOUT CAKE FOR YOU!"

So yeah.  We're Girl Scouts now.  Kind of.

Done

The Monster's first birthday party happened.  Here's an update on how I handled my to-do list:

1. Work 8 hours at my job (the one that's non-party, non-blog related).  Done.

2. Finish stuffing and sewing 14 felt monster dolls.  Remember these?

This is how it looks when the Internet makes things.

This is how it looks when I make things.

I posted this one on Facebook with the caption "I'm 90% certain this is not what sewing is supposed to look like."  Some of you helpfully pointed out that I don't read French.  Some of you are not very nice.

They were a joint effort.  Because remember that sewing machine that I've never managed to thread correctly or make a single stitch on, ever?  That is still true.  For me.  Not so for my husband:

After he finished the monsters, he hemmed a pair of pants and two skirts.  This is not a joke.

I think mine have more personality than the ones from the tutorial.  Right?  And by personality I mean "errors, holes, terrible needlework, and loose threads."

Most of them had to be patched up because they were literally bursting at the seams with personality.

3. Cut out around 70 more pages of printable party materials including paper bunting, banners, favor tags, signs, and cupcake wrappers (also purchased here).  One at a time.  With an X-acto knife.  Well, between the two of us we managed maybe 50 of those pages.  Skipped the party hats and a couple other things.  But we managed to get some stuff done.  It looked like a party.

4. Assemble all of the above and hang in aesthetically pleasing arrangements around the house.  Done.  By me.  At 2 a.m.

5. Blow up 75 balloons.  tHe O.G. gets full credit for this one.  Of course he overfilled most of them as he is wont to do and they started popping, loudly and without provocation.  So that was fun.

6. Grocery shop.  Done, at 9 p.m.  I bought cupcake liners, then tried to put them in my cupcake pan and discovered they were JUMBO cupcake liners.  Really?

The box said they would fit in standard cupcake pans, though.  Whew.  Turns out the box is a liar.  So I improvised:

Perfect.

7. Bake and decorate 4 dozen cupcakes in a monster theme.  Questionable.  There were cupcakes.  They were frosted.  Some of them even looked kind of...furry?  In a good way.  Maybe.  I mean, it was intentional frosting fur, not like, something gross that doesn't belong on a cupcake.  But they were NOT adorable little cupcake monsters with teeth and eyes.  Because I finally got around to making the frosting somewhere around an hour before the party started, and my little fur frosting tip kept clogging, and whatever, he's ONE!

8. Bake and decorate 1 smash cake in a monster theme.  Nope.  Didn't even try.  Monster got a cupcake like everybody else and liked it.

No, really.  He liked it.  A lot.

9. Wrap birthday presents.  With help from the Princess.  No photo of that, sadly, but trust me when I say it was well-wrapped.

10. Dice a boatload of fruit for baby-friendly fruit salad.  Done, with help from my friend Pam, who complained the entire time that she doesn't know how to cut fruit and what are you supposed to do with the nectarine pit, just cut around it?  It's slimy.  And tHe O.G. provided a watermelon monster head for the fruit salad, because he is the official Carver of Gourds and Melons in our household.  I don't have a photo of the watermelon monster right at this moment but I promise to post one when I get it.

11. Locate, gather, and decorate various receptacles and containers for serving snacks, cupcakes, drinks, ice, favors, etc.  Well, stuff got stuck in bowls, so I guess that's good enough.  Also I put stripes and fur on the cupcake stand.

12. Finish unpacking.  (Alternatively, hide all boxes in the garage.  Probably the more likely option.)  Put tHe O.G. on this and he did a fabulous job of concealing boxes.

13. Feed my family meals, as apparently they cannot go 28 1/2 hours without eating even when I am BUSY.  I can't remember.  I'm pretty sure we ate.  Oh I think we got pizza Friday night.  Totally counts.

14. Parent a kindergartner and a one-year-old.  They're still alive, so I get full credit for this one.

15. Clean my entire house.  Props to my husband on this.  Took Friday off work and cleaned the whole house.  Ha.  Sorry, he's taken.

16. Photograph this entire process for your eventual enjoyment.  See above.

17. Blog and tweet (obviously).  I think I at least tweeted.  And updated FB from time to time.  So if you're not a Facebook fan or a Twitter follower, you missed out on my 2 a.m. ramblings:

18. Possibly sleep (unlikely).  5 whole hours, baby.