Transition for the Boy, Transition for the Fam
Today was the boy's last day at daycare. He's been going since September 1, 2003. Damn near five years is a long time. Under the watchful and loving eyes of some great women, he kiddo's transitioned from a baby to a toddler to a tyke to a preschooler and, now, to a kindergartener.
Damn, that's scary.
But, hey, keep on rolling, y'know? Gotta roll with the changes. That's all you can do.
Party Castle
To honor the boy's last day, I made him a cake--but not just any cake. I didn't do this little celebration in any half measures, thank you very much. I went full-tilt boogie on this baby. I reached down deep inside of me, got in touch with my inner Martha Stewart and saw what my inner shriveled up 'ol busybody could do.
No, my inner Martha wasn't this serious.
Nor was my inner Martha this...stoned out of her gord on cheap tequila.
Yeah, this looks about the speed of my inner Martha--nicely medicated for that "life is good" glow.
Okay, so me and my inner Martha whipped out a castle cake when we weren't busy editing (well, me at least--don't know what else my inner Martha can do but for sure as hell she can't edit drug monographs). Yes, that's right, Gentle Reader. I got a chance to use the new Nordic Ware castle cake pan I hauled home from Chicago as a giftie for the boy.
After a fun 8.something-mile run at the gym Wednesday morning, I ran over to HEB to pick up supplies. At this point, Gentle Reader, I must make a confession and beg for mercy from my inner Martha: I had intended to make my own frosting and make the cake "healthful" (yes, Gentle Reader, I make cakes from boxed mixes--so friggin' sue me for being a faudie pressed for time), but there are only so many hours in the day, and some of them are already claimed for working out, some of them are claimed for making money, some of them are claimed for hanging out with the husband on the couch reading that day's Wall Street Journal and watch the Fox Comedy Hour and some of them (a lot of them, it seems) are claimed for blogging. Faced with limited time, I...I bought frosting--the house brand, no less. May the FSM and Martha Stewart forgive me for such blasphemy! May my own dear mum forgive me for such blasphemy!
Anywho, not feeling too terribly guilty about serving little kids store-bought house-brand frosting and, once I got started, putting in all the oil the recipe on the back of the box calls for, I had myself an upside castle pan filled with batter. And because I was the only human at Chez Boeckman-Walker, I had to tackle that terrible task of licking the beaters all by my lonesome. Damn, life is tough sometimes.
After roughly 42 minutes in the oven, I had myself a puffy-bottomed castle cake. As I drew it out of the oven and set it out to cool on my trusty wire rack, I offered a few prayers to the good 'ol FSM that when I turned the pan over to release the cake, said cake would not fall apart. I just did not have time to make a second cake, and my inner Martha wasn't up for the challenge of piecing together a collapsed and crumbling castle of cake.
The Nonsexual Joys of Frosting
I know I'm a freak anyway, but feel free, Gentle Reader, to call me a freak for enjoying working with frosting. I don't have a visual arts bone in my body (unlike my uber-talented husband and son, both of whom can draw really incredible stuff), but when I'm mixing tints and dyes to get just the right shade of a color for a cake or choosing just the right tip for applying the frosting or applying the frosting with just the right amount of pressure.... Well, dammit, I feel a bit artistic. Don't ever expect to see me on Food Network's latest taping of the Sugar Arts Show in Tulsa. The FSM only knows what I'd do if I ran into that other favorite shriveled up 'ol busybody....
Making art with your own frosting is one thing. Attempting to make art with frosting from a machine is a totally different thing. Plus I was challenged by the exterior of the finished cake itself, which nicely retained all the stones and rocks and parapets and battlements and windows and ledges and whatnot sculpted into the pan. While I was thrilled these details came through, I knew there was no way on the FSM's beautiful bowl of fettuccine that I'd be able to make those details come to life with frosting within the limited time I had. Again, don't ever expect to see me on one of the Food Network's cake competitions. I'll leave that up to the Bronwyn and the Ace of Cakes, two of my culinary heroes.
Considering I own all of five different Wilton tips and was trying to get supper ready so we could go to Patrice's book signing, I think I did a half-assed job of making the cake castle not so dark and forboding and worth of a Dark Tower party.
Decorating, Day Two
As usual, I woke up bright and early, dressed to kickbox (since that's what I do after breakfast on Thursdays), got breakfast for the indoor residents of Chez Boeckman-Walker, ate said breakfast, applied for a freelance job or two then scooted my bootie to the kitchen to tackle the next cake decorating hurdle: making stained glass windows.
I struck upon the brilliant idea of using smashed Dum Dums, which well-meaning relatives have gifted upon the boy by the gross and which we don't let him have except on the rare occasion because the boy, we learned earlier this summer, has been gifted with teeth that rot easily, so he therefore doesn't need a lot of sugar to help "the bugs" in his teeth rot them. After picking out some colors that I thought would work well, I then set my mind to answer the question, "And what to use to adhese them to the cake?"
The answer was in the same plastic Jack-o-lantern candy bucket from which I'd found the Dum Dums: little peppermint bonbons from Central Markup that we'd present to Ganesh during last year's Pancha Ganapati. I don't think dear Ganesh would mind too much my using his prasad to remove this obstacle of finding a clear(ish) edible adhesive for the castle cake.
(Dear Ganesh is the patron of writers and remove of obstacles, so it's only right that he and one of his many mantra appear her on The Faudie's rant-log.)
Getting the bonbons to melt was an arduous task. I kept adding a little bit of water and a little bit of light corn syrup to help things along, and finally I got a gooey mess and got to work.
After doing about a dozen or more windows, I piped on some creamy peanut butter to articulate the rocks upon which the castle's supposed to sit. After sitting on the counter all night, said creamy peanut butter piped on like a dream; if only the store-brought frosting had piped on that easily! (Of course, if I hadn't thrown it into the 'fridge for fear of it melting before I started applying it....)
The penultimate finishing touch was a moat. I added a little blue dye to my leftover frosting-in-a-can, stirred it up, dropped it into the pastry bag and gave it a squeeze. I was quite pleased with the striations in the blue frosting resulting from my not fulling mixing the dye in. Plus the frosting helps hide the fact that I wasn't able to level the bottom of the cake (because once that baby was on the plastic plate that's part of my cake dome, that baby wasn't going anywhere--and I for sure as hell wasn't going to try to make it).
The pièce de résistance?
Flags for the parapets. Not just any flags, mind you. They're made from origami paper (Chez Boeckman-Walker is bereft of construction paper, believe it or not) in the boy's favorite colors then glued to bamboo skewers I bought so the boy could make chocolate-covered bananas. To further customize the flags, I nabbed stickers from the boy's stash (another trove built up by well-meaning relatives, although I don't mind stickers--when he doesn't put them all over the furniture in his bedroom) that represent him and his passions: a T. Rex ('cuz the boy's nuts about dinos), a Thomas the Tank Engine ('cuz the residents of the Island of Sodor have his father and I--or at least our bank account--by the short curlies), a tiny photo sticker of Shrimpy Anakin at the controls of his pod racer ('cuz the boy is five years old and everyone knows The Phantom Menace was written to please five-year-old little boys) and a flag of South Korea ('cuz that's the boy's first home).
Nifty, non?
After hand-tying five two-rose bouquets for his teachers, gathering up the juice and all the other supplies we'd need for the party then, last but not least, making myself presentable, I headed off to the boy's daycare.
Party Time!
The party was small but raucous. I was maudlin at times because, well, the teachers at the boy's daycare have been wonderful, because I'm going to miss them tremendously--I'm going to miss their loving, caring presence in the boy's life--and because I can't help but feel that the boy's childhood is in a way coming to an end with his departure from daycare and his entrance into school. If you ever really want to get me ranting, ask me my opinion of No Child Left Behind and the state of public education and what educational priorities are these days. These women truly love my son, and he truly loves them. That's not a situation you walk away from easily.
But the boy was oblivious to all these adult concerns. He and his friends had themselves a good sugar rush, then it was off to play before moms and dads and grandmas came to pick them up. When it was our turn to leave, we said our good-byes, gave out lots of hugs, shared some tears then hit the road.
Okay, dammit, I'm getting misty writing this. Gads, I'm pathetic! Somebody slap me.
Here are some pictures of the boy's party and final playtime. Enjoy!
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