Sage turned 4 a few weeks ago. I can’t believe my kid is 4 freaking years old!! I remember when I could hold her without straining my back. I remember when she would scream her head off all three hours of church. I remember when she first started talking and me loving the way she interpreted the way words sounded to her. Now she’s 4 and can do pretty much everything on her own, aside from preparing her food and wiping her bum.
This year, though money was tight, we decided to fork out the dough to get a professional cake made. Maybe we did this because time was limited, and we were still recovering from getting everything ready for Gregg’s solo art show. I wish that was mostly the truth—we are sugar addicts, and this cakery lady can make a cake that is absolute bomb diggity.
I drove over, the day before Sage’s birthday, to pick up the cake, and I was shocked by how TALL she made it. It was so cute with flowers and ladybugs. And the smell. The smell of chocolaty confections. I could sit and smell it all day long. She said to be very careful bringing it home. I took her advice seriously, and I kept the cake perfectly level throughout the drive back.
I was so excited to show Sage the cake, and as I opened it, she burst into tears. Her uber cute cake had experienced a very centralized earthquake within the box it was carted in. Holy disaster!!
She was so upset, but in typical opportunistic fashion, Gregg and I spun it like this—‘don’t be upset, Sage—we can start eating it TODAY. Now we don’t have to wait until tomorrow!’ It worked. Duh! Of course it was going to work because what kid wants to put off having cake??
So, Sage’s perfect garden party cake turned into an apocalyptic garden party cake! Later that day she apologized to me. I asked her why she was apologizing. “Mom, I ate some of the flowers off the cake.” Wow. I was impressed by her sneakiness. When it comes to chocolate, it is usually caked all over her face so I had no idea she had been jacking the decorations off her cake. Needless to say, I told her not to sweat it since it was her birthday cake, but if it had been someone else’s cake, she would have been in a world of hurt.
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So, I have this theory. Basically, it’s that kids won’t remember what presents they got for their birthday when they are grown, they won’t remember the tiny details we all sweat, they’ll remember the awesome.
Getting to eat your cake early because it went all apocalyptic on you? There’s no way that won’t be awesome.
Eating birthday cake before your birthday is bomb diggity. Thank goodness they won’t remember all the ways we screw up!!