13th Birthday

It happened. They said it would and it did. Kyndall hit me with a “broski” for the first time the other night.

What happened to “mom?”

Actually, what happened to mama? It’s like I blinked and my chubby cheeked mama’s girl turned into a joggers wearing, croc loving, “bro” calling, teenager.

When Kyndall was three she called me Jewie for close to a year, and when Mike and I started dating, he was known as “Jim” for about six months.

During a teacher meeting Kyndall’s first grade year, her teacher told me that Kyndall had begun spelling her name incorrectly - different variations like Kindall, Kyndal, Kendall. She went on to say that she knew Kyndall could spell it correctly, so she wasn’t concerned, but she went ahead and asked Kyndall why she was doing this. Kyndall responded, “Well it’s my name, so I can spell It however I want.” I cringed a little and responded, “I’m sorry, I bet she tells you all kind of things.” She smiled and said, “Oh yeah, yesterday she showed me her new shirt and said, ‘Look! It makes me look like I have boobies.’”

Palm to forehead.

That almost tops the time she told a waitress that I was pregnant, getting married, and she was getting a baby goat. She was three and none of those things were true.

And while there’s no telling when Kyndall is going to tell your deepest, darkest secrets, or when she is going to burst into dance moves, you can always be certain that she is going to go out of her way to be kind and thoughtful. She is always going to make you feel loved.

Today she is 13 - officially a teenager and officially the coolest kid I know.

She’s not cool in the normal way though.

She’s cool like an 83 year old who needs to nap during her own birthday party, sings Prince songs at a loud but reasonable level, spends hours researching hamster/bird care and creates presentations to show her work. She’s a messy bun, card playing, animal loving, sister tolerating, dad joke telling, kind of cool.

She’s my favorite kind of cool, and I love her to the moon.

Piece of cake

Remember when I decorated cakes on the side? Yeah, me either.

Apparently it’s been a while since I last made one. I tried thinking back, and from what I can remember this wedding cake was the last one I made, and that was back in June of 2018.

Kyndall hasn’t wanted a birthday cake in several years, opting instead for cookies, cake pops, popcorn balls, or even jalapeño poppers - because it's Kyndall - and because I had gotten so busy doing other things, like wedding videos, temporarily running a wedding venue, and actually hating the whole cake making process anyway, I stopped making cakes for the public.

Short story within a story. (Swipe right again.) This was a wedding cake that I made that same summer in 2018. I had already spent hours baking, dirty icing and icing the top tiers. I was working on the bottom and last tier. I was attempting a new technique which is normally done with fondant, but I was using some weird leaf tip to do it with royal icing instead. It took me TWO hours to ice that tier. TWO HOURS. As I finished up, I pulled the tier towards me to slide it off the table and place it in the fridge. It was like slow motion as I watched it tip, slide off the table and crash on to the floor.

Ugh. Heartbreaking.

I grabbed a beer out of the refrigerator, sat down, slowly drank it all, and then mixed up a new batch of batter to start over.

Anywho, back to this cake. Waverley celebrated her first birthday during a pandemic, so no birthday cake was needed then. I secretly loved that I couldn’t throw a big first birthday bash. I was tired and overwhelmed, and while I didn’t get to use the sweet bunny decorations I had intended to, it was a relief to have a small party at home with her, Mike, Kyndall and myself.

But this year I felt obligated to throw Wavy her first birthday party and make her first birthday cake even though she is turning two.

Making a cake is a process - a lengthy, drawn out, pain in the butt, messy process - and while everyone does things differently, ideally I should have been baking the layers Tuesday night, dirty icing the tiers Wednesday night and letting it set in the refrigerator, and then decorating the cake Thursday night. This would allow me to have Friday night to pick up the house and enjoy the party Saturday.

But because of unforeseen circumstances, that is not how my week went at all. Instead, I ended up baking the layers Thursday night - two nights behind schedule. And because it had been so long since I had made a cake, I had forgotten absolutely everything involved.

I couldn’t remember how much batter to use for an eight inch pan or how long to bake each layer. I ran out of oil. I couldn’t find my saw. I had forgotten to buy crisco to grease the pans. And with each blunder I made, it took everything in me to keep going and not toss it all out.

It took everything in me to make this cake. I had absolutely no desire to deal with. I didn't want to bake it, ice it, or clean up after. I was dreading everything about it. I mean really, would Wavy even notice there wasn’t a cake? Would she care at all? Nope. Not one bit. But my dadgum mom guilt wouldn’t let me quit.

After realizing I didn’t have all of the ingredients I needed to make the icing, I finally gave up Thursday night, wrapped the layers in foil, said to hell with it, and went to bed. Friday after school, I picked up the missing ingredients, went home, and got to work. Now mind you, this part should have been a two day process, but I was in F it mode, and did not care.

I whipped up some icing, slapped some on the tiers, and threw them in the fridge for a few minutes. Normally, I would have liked for the tiers to sit for several hours, if not for a full day, but remember the F it attitude was in full swing. Ten minutes went by, I pulled tier one out and went to work. The plan was blue royal icing with melted pink chocolate on top - kind of like the melted ice cream cake look. It didn’t turn out great, but it was okay.

I popped that sucker back in the fridge and grabbed the second tier. This one was a simple pineapple that just needed a three star icing tip. Easy peasy. I then poured some green candy melts on foil, ran a toothpick through them to give them a leaf look and let them set. As soon as those hardened up, I popped them in the top of the pineapple, and threw that tier back in the fridge.

Not my best work, but not awful.

The next morning I awoke to find that not only was my pineapple now leaning more than the tower of Pisa, but that the bottom tier looked like someone had attempted to sit on it and it didn’t hold up very well.

Perfect.

I pushed some dowel rods through the pineapple and manhandled it enough to get it closer to an upright position and then re-iced over the parts of it I had destroyed. There was nothing that could be done for the bottom tier. It was what it was and it was too late to change it.

I plopped the cake on the stand and walked away, tail between my legs.

Before Wavy even blew out the candles, the entire backside of the pineapple fell off, and then I realized long after everyone had left that I had forgotten to put vanilla in the icing.

It was a disaster.

Every bit of it.

But Wavy enjoyed it, and that’s all that matters.

And I never have to make a cake again, and that makes me happy, too.

Buffalo sandwiches

Story time.

A few years ago, Whataburger released a new buffalo ranch chicken strip sandwich, or something similar to that with an equally long name.

Let me preface this story by saying, I am a big fan of food. Big fan - especially spicy food.

I was really excited about this sandwich, like really excited. Really, really.

I’m going to venture out and say this is like in the fall of 2015, which is completly irrelevant to the story, except to say, that this sandwich was so important in my life, I remember the year it was released.

So try now to picture it. Mike and I, 2015, about to go out for the night, and I’m psyched about hitting up Whataburger afterward for a freakishly long named buffalo sandwich.

I have no idea where we went or what we did that night, but I do remember that we ended up in a fight.

Mike and I do not fight very often. We get into arguments of course, but they are usually quickly resolved and then we are over it and moving on.

However, this night, the night I was supposed to try the highly anticipated buffalo sandwich, we got into a doozie.

Fortunately, I was the one driving us home, so mid-quarrel, I rolled up into the Whataburger drive through.

Mike was unimpressed by my determination and my notable dedication to trying the buffalo sandwich. He sat cross armed in the passenger seat while I ordered the long awaited “buffalo ranch chicken strip sandwich, add lettuce and tomatoes, please.”

I don’t know if I offered to order him anything and he refused, or if I was so focused, I didn’t think to get him anything, but either way, he left empty handed, and I left with the buffalo sandwich.

We continued to argue all the way home, into the house, and as we got into bed.

Sidenote: I don’t know why I waited to eat the sandwich until I got into bed. Maybe I thought I needed to be in my happy place to fully experience the sandwich’s greatness.

Who knows.

Anywho, I remember this moment like it was yesterday. I opened the wrapper to find a sloppy, buffalo goodness, dripping everywhere. Mike and I were still arguing. I slathered ranch on top, and took a bite.

It was everything I had been hoping for.

Mike was mid sentence as I held the sandwich in front of his face.

He took a bite.

And then we sat in awe and silence as we ate the sandwich together, appreciating its perfectly combined crispy chicken strips, spicy buffalo sauce, and buttermilk ranch.

Our argument was over. Our life was good. Our bellies were full.

And that’s the story of how the buffalo ranch chicken strip sandwich from Whataburger saved my relationship.

Happy Friday, friends, and may all of your arguments be resolved with food!