"Cake Wrecks" or "What Happens When I Help My Cub Scouts"

My lovely sons are cub scouts and they like it.  They learn stuff and feel good about accomplishing stuff and get patches and stuff.  And stuff.  But this time of year, ready or not, I have to grit my teeth, roll up my sleeves, and be a mom to two cub scouts.  

I don't like February's Blue and Gold Banquet.  Or March's Pinewood Derby.  They are labor-intensive. Our ward has a cake baking/decorating activity to go along with Blue and Gold Banquets. I thought I was being smart this year when I picked a dozen cake options online and had each boy pick what kind of cake they wanted to decorate.  JO picked well.  He made a paper template, and did a Ninja design with powdered sugar and red sugar granules "for the blood."  

                 JO's is the cake on the left on the blue tablecloth.

With two boys, I have double the opportunity to ruin a cake.  This year I almost ruined RO's.  Apparently I've watched too many episodes of Cake Boss.  I didn't realize how hard it would be to make a 3D pirate ship.  I also don't apply my basic knowledge of physics to every day life.  

RO baked two cakes and we froze them.  Then Tuesday morning I made three layers of awesomeness, carved into the exact shape of a pirate ship.  This was going to be good.  I was going to dirty ice the cake for RO (Cake Boss nod) so he could decorate with chocolate wafers for the railing, Pirouettes (like cereal straws) for cannons and the mast, Cocoa Krispies for cannonballs, a peanut butter cup for the steering wheel (all boat-savvy people call them steering wheels, right?) and coconut dyed blue for the ocean waves.  But the icing was too heavy.  After a can and a half of frosting RO's cake fell apart-- I shouldn't have tapered the sides.  Stress!  

If only he'd wanted to decorate the Titanic, then we would've been in business.  The wrecked cake was on the table when the kids got home, and JO wasn't impressed with RO's cake.  He thought it was horrible. RO said "Woah! What happened?"  Another cake was in the oven almost ready to go.  RO ended up making a cool cake, just on a smaller scale, using some of the collapsed cake, and adding some legos.  The cub master teased him about legos not being edible, but at that point I didn't care.  The end result was almost much, much worse!  

Notice the shark eating the pirate who just walked the plank?  A nice touch, I think.

So. . . 

Mom, can we please start working on our Pinewood Derby cars now?  

I'm in Love!

(with our new vacuum cleaner)

We Got Jimmered!

(clap, clap, cla, cla, clap)

RO and I traveled (via actual airplane!) to the land of Jimmer where we were simultaneously surrounded by loved ones and enjoyed a little one-on-one time.   I miss out on so much living far away, so this was so nice to be able to have some time in the middle of winter to spend time with my family.

On Saturday my oldest brother, Andrew, bought RO a BYU basketball t-shirt and we were treated to seats at the BYU v. UNLV basketball game with all three of my brothers. Then we went to Los Hermanos with my parents, my three brothers, Andrew, Steve, and Dave, my two sisters-in-law, Crystal and Logan, and two of my nieces. Los Hermanos is a favorite family hangout where we enojy huge helpings of chile verde, chile relleno, nachos, smothered burritos and fried ice cream.  Nuff said.  Steve had to go back to work because the person who he'd arranged to cover his Saturday/Sunday shift went home.  Some people are so

classy.

 On Sunday my baby brother's amazing and tiny and cute and not-mine-so-it's-okay-if-she-only-sleeps-one-hour-at-a-time-at-night baby got blessed.   

(see how tired she is?)

Sunday afternoon and evening we were at Dave's in-law's home for dinner, the game, and so much food including, but not limited to way too many chocolate chip and peanut butter cookies.  

Monday, after RO watched Jurassic Park, we took my parents and Andrew to our family's favorite spot, the Dinosaur Museum.

After touring BYU's Legacy sports memorabilia building (my dad and Andrew saw Robbie Bosco in the elevator) and a lunch there, we had frozen yogurt, mine was strawberry with mochi topping.  RO's was topped with practically everything chocolate he could think of, plus lots of bubble gum.  Funny kid!

After Mom got home from dropping my brother off at the airport, it was off to Trafalga with Grandma and Uncle Buckethead's family for mini golf, Dippin Dots, and game tokens.  (Did we have fun and is JO ugly?  Check the 8 ball RO got with all his tickets!)

We had dinner: chicken and cabbage with sautéed sweet onions, tomatoes and invisible black beans (because we completely forgot about them).  And dessert was root beer floats.  If you're counting, yes, that's three kinds of frozen desserts in one day.

Tuesday morning RO and his grandma went to the museum while I did some thrift store shopping.  Not that I didn't want to walk through a museum, just that thrifting is way cooler than that. Love you, Mom!  We packed our bags full of clothes and future birthday presents and headed north to Dave's house.  While there, we checked in on drywallers who never showed up because sometimes you just need to wait for drywallers to not show up.  (It's how you take a break from all the fun and excitement during a vacation.)  While RO was relaxing there, in front of a TV, I went with my mom and Steve to some open houses in the area.  We stayed at Steve and Crystal's house Tuesday night.  RO watched Kung Fu Panda and I did a Kitchenaid homemade bread tutorial and was tutored in both the proper way to roll rolls AND how to knife pictures onto an egg-washed bread loaf.  Dinner was pizza.  And root beer floats.

Wednesday morning RO watched Toy Story 2 and we turned our fresh-baked bread into french toast with homemade Magleby's syrup and fresh whipped cream.  Steve threw pottery, I watched in awe.  My brother made a beautiful bowl in 10 minutes.  Then we went to RO's Great Grandmother's house to visit, eat takeout, reinstall a voice-to-text phone, and have cookies and ice cream before heading to the airport.  RO and I had a blizzard shake at the airport and were surprised to find that Ben, JO, SO, and CO brought milkshakes to share with us at the baggage claim area.

We had a fun vacation and were spoiled rotten the perfect amount.  And this weekend, thanks to Andrew, who gave me a DVD copy of the animated Gulliver's Travels movie I recently blogged about, I will get to hang out with my own family, but I'm not offering them seven kinds of frozen desserts.  Ben seems to have survived being a single dad and only lost one child.  But he found her again so, he remains a pretty awesome guy.

Well, wouldn't you know it?  Blogging doesn't get the vacation laundry washed and folded.  Hmmm.  I had better take my dad's advice and wrap it up.  Love you, Dad!