60 Sucks...the Epic Fail Resolution

So, remember how in my last post I was writing it at 2:30 in the morning because I had the epic fail of awesomeness with the stacked cake, so I was going to make a sheet cake?

Well, the sheet cake was also an epic fail. The client wanted half chocolate, half vanilla together in one cake. And I knew... I KNEW as soon as I started frosting that it wasn't going to work. When the chocolate cake started pulling apart during the crumb coat, not the actual frosting... I knew I was doomed, but I tried to persevere, anyway.

And the weird thing is that on both the sheet cake and stacked cake, it was the chocolate cake that failed. The vanilla was fine. So, apparently, I need to revisit that particular recipe.

So, at about 3:30 in the morning, I finally broke down, searching through my pantry in tears for magical Option #3. When I came across the marshmallows, I knew I had it. I made marshmallow fondant, and after a few failed attempts to make badges for cupcakes with NY Mets colors of orange, white, and blue, I finally dyed the fondant orange, and used white icing to pipe "60" and blue icing to pipe "Sucks!"

See, it was a surprise 60th birthday party, and they wanted "60 Sucks!" with a bunch of lollipops as a cake topper. Tongue-in-cheek cute, right? Or maybe back-handedly insulting? Either way, it was a close group of people, and they thought it would be hilarious. I ended up sticking a blue and orange Tootsie Pop mini sucker (with white writing on the labels! Mets colors!) on the top of every cupcake, so they looked like this:


I had gone to bed at 5:30 in the morning with the plan to sleep until about 8, but then, ironically, I couldn't really get to sleep. At 8, I texted the client, telling her that the cake gods were really, really angry with me.

She replied, "Fire and brimstone angry?"

I explained the situation as succinctly as I could, aided in large part by sending her the photo of the epic fail. Then I told her that cake #2 also failed, so I made badges for cupcakes (sent pic) and was willing to provide 24 to 36 cupcakes for free, and lend her any cupcake display equipment that I had. She was okay with that--even insisted on paying me anyway--and so I got up, went to the store for eggs, shortening, and cocoa powder (somehow I  had run out during the night, imagine that), and got to work baking.

For once, everything turned out fine--and worked the first time.

She sent me a photo from the party, and said that everyone loved the cupcakes. I think cupcakes are kind of more fun at casual parties anyway--but of course I would think that after the night that I had!

Early in the Evening of Failure, before things started to go bad, I had told Sean that my sister texted me to tell me that she thought the Sweet 13 post was hilarious, because she could imagine Sean trying to duck and cover. 

"She asked if you minded being the comic relief," I said.

"And what did you say?" he asked.

"I said that you didn't mind because you never really read my blog, but I had told you that you were the comic relief, and that sometimes you peek over my shoulder at what I'm writing. And I only (mostly) tell the truth, anyway."

"Mostly?"

"Yeah, well, in the football helmet one I posted a hypothetical conversation where we were talking about football, and since I root for the perceived underdogs, I asked you which defensive line was smaller, and you said, 'what's a defensive line?' "

He just kind of looked at me.

I said, "I know, I know, that's probably unfair. You know what a defensive line is. Probably even better than I do."

He said, "Yes. It's a line. They get very defensive. They really don't take criticism very well."

I started laughing so hard I was crying, and then he was laughing at me laughing so hard that I was crying, that he started to cry.  I kept trying to stop and get control of myself, but then would say, "they don't take criticism very well! Haaaaa!" and I would snort and be off laughing again. The whole thing lasted for about 10 minutes.

So in case you didn't know what a defensive line in football is, it's a bunch of big, angry men, all lined up--who happen to not take criticism very well!