Party preparations

This post started as an email to a dear, helpful, understanding friend who is a mom and is ahead of me in many, many ways, and, dare I say, has many similar obsessions tendencies to mine. Instead of emailing her, I decided to plagarize myself and post it here instead and send her the link. Is that a horrible thing to do? I hope not.

I went to the party store and got solid colors like you told me to (Target had a PALTRY selection). I put three colors on the floor and HD chose two, so we got orange and bright/lime green. I'm happy. Not ecstatic, but happy. I plan to bake my turtle cupcakes tomorrow afternoon and doing it in advance is making me feel slightly less anxious about it. Had to briefly abandon a full shopping cart in the aisle (I notified the staff, more so they wouldn't undo what I had already chosen, and less so to be courteous) to leave the party store due to HD's hunger. I was stretching the start of lunch time way beyond his means and he pulled my hair hard enough for me to scream out loud - really loud - to remind me of his actual age. Sometimes I forget that he's only going to be one and think he can hold out for things like lunch until, say, dinner, like BH and I sometimes do.

I fed HD the Trader Joe's cheddar cheese stick in pea sized pieces to get through the rest of the visit. Then, after shoving him full of Cheerios in the parked car, I did the unthinkable...I took him to a second (party store) location, so I could get the prescribed disposable pastry bags, the branded colors for the icing, and the appropriate baking tips for the pastry bags. [Note: When I first read that I needed to use baking tips #12 and #18, I scoured the rest of the instructions looking for those helpful "tips."] This way, if I fail, I will only be able to blame it on myself, not a product substitution. We picked out a birthday hat, some candles, and only called my sister 11 times and BH (in meetings) 4 times for help choosing between items and to successfully be convinced one last time not to do the Baby Sesame Street stuff (by my sister, not BH) - due to high cost and low appropriateness (HD has not seen Sesame Street). HD was an angel, likely because he was fatigued by the lack of food in his system.

I approach tomorrow afternoon's baking adventure with equal parts nausea, excited anticipation, and fear of failure - and I'm not even doing the icing part until Friday.

Comments

[dear, helpful, understanding friend]

1) Why didn't you call me 11 times?! Was I too mean about the sesame street plates last time? What?!

2) I have read the words "blah blah blah like you told me to" about a hundred times over by now. This is music to my ears. I think you are the first person who has ever done anything I told them to. Ever.

3) Please call tomorrow when you are baking these cupcakes. I can't tell you how much I wish I could be there to cheer you on, watch it all unfold, and even try to be helpful. Pastry bags terrify me.