Skidamarink a doo doo doo.

Help me find the humor in this. Please.

It's that dreaded money-making holiday. I'm being fun mom/good wife today. I break out the cute tablecloth, have heart plates for breakfast, make heart sandwiches for lunch with pink lemonade, whip up a batch of red 40 cupcakes that I had intended to be our dessert for supper - grilled New York strips, roasted baby red potatoes, carrots & peas, bottle of wine. I even text the Significant Other to inform him that the dessert passed the taste test.

I put the boys down for a nap. The girls and I head downstairs. They're playing princess. I hop on the treadmill with my ipod and my book. So, I can't hear anything. On a whim - gut instinct- I decide to run up quick and check.

My baby. MINE. THE TWERP. Has completely destroyed a dozen cupcakes. Completely. Not salvageable. So much for my rant of knowing where my kids are and what they're doing at all times. Eating words is bitter.

And. I made a special trip to the store with extra kids this morning to get this dumb cupcake stuff. For this dumb holiday. Husband?? ---I love you. And you don't need cupcakes to know that. But, I'll try again. Tomorrow.

"The Cake" Day.

This makes me look a titch crazy -or something. So this one goes out to those I feel closest to - those who know I'm a bit fuzzy around the edges and love me anyways. Especially to my husband -the glue that holds me together. I've come to realize as of late that it's the little mundane details of life that really make life what it is. And a grand adventure it is. So here's my adventure for Saturday, February 12th.

I eat breakfast. Evan, Nolan, Alan and Tanner leave for the day to skii Welch. It's 8:30 and I start work on THE CAKE. That one that I may have mentioned. It has 16 whole eggs and 11 whites. It's supposed to be gorgeous. Let's remember that. It's now Noon. My mom burned a pot of soup. Apparently, that's possible. We ate it for lunch. Except for Wyatt - he ate a cup of cheese curds and a piece of bread with mayo. Gag. How are that kid's eyes not brown? No clue. I eat in 12 minutes and am back to assemble the cake. It's put together and ready to sit in the freezer for a bit before frosting. We nestle it amongst the 350 pounds of meat in the garage freezer. Let's confirm: yes, I worked on the cake for a solid 3 1/2 hours.

Now it's time for a break. Bundle the kids up in their snow gear and Gpa/Gma haul them off in a huge sled on the snowmobile to the monster sledding hill out back. I strap on snow shoes, plug myself into my ipod and pump myself up for the 2 mile hike to the back 40*. It's glorious. I can sing my wee heart out and not a soul can hear me. I rocked some "Hey Juliet," a little Soul Asylum for reminiscing about old times, some Ga-Ga, Bush, Smash Mouth, Led Zeppelin, Kesha, Feist, Colin B, Kanye, Pink. It was a good ol' time. A well rounded bunch. Finally meet up with the crew at the hill and have a blast tubing farmer style. Walk up the hill? What a ridiculous notion. That's what the Polaris is for. Jarred my back a bit...but all in the name of good fun. So, that's okay. Gang heads back and I start the trek back home thinking about how much I'm going to enjoy eating my cake guilt-free. I have a spring in my step...this day is awesome...I love the Lord, I love my family, I love my friends, LIFE is good.

The cake. I open the freezer. My cake. My heart drops. SOMEONE. THREW. A. FULL. PORK LOIN. ON. TOP. OF. MY CAKE. MY 3.5 hour labor of "I'm snowshoeing 4 miles for a piece of this." Uh. "MOM? What happened to my CAKE??" Apparently, my dear, darling nephew decided he was going to help himself to the ice cream. And THREW A FULL PORK LOIN ON TOP OF MY CAKE.

See, people (okay, mostly my dear, dear husband who has no qualms about letting Cole eat a sandwich without wiping his hands at least 6 times per half**) think I'm a bit OCD about certain things and a little bit controlling about certain things. But. It's for MY OWN benefit. See, I know where my kids are at all times. I know pretty much what they're doing at all times. I stress over and over again about "eat neat. don't make a mess." because I don't like vacuuming daily. I don't like wiping my table off constantly. So, therefore, don't make a mess...there's not one to clean up. My kids know this. Also. ASK FOR THINGS THAT ARE BEYOND YOUR REACH. I WILL HELP YOU. Please. Let me help you. So I can stay relatively sane. Please. Okay, so I might need to relax a bit. But. If I would have been here...I would have known where the kids were. And, trust me, they would NOT HAVE BEEN IN THE FREEZER CHUCKING PORK LOINS ON MY CAKE.

I manage to sort of salvage the cake. I open the fridge to get my bowl of lovingly and painstakingly prepared buttercream frosting. I discover it's done some funky separating thing. Grand. Lovely. I rewhip it the best I can. Which is not good. It's watery. It's loose. At least it's delicious. I slap it on the cake and not-so-gently throw it in the cake carrier*** and toss it in the fridge. Best of luck to it. I'm so sitting down with a cup of tea now.****

I can't stay out of my Mother's kitchen. It's big and gorgeous and big and full of counters and big. And - the best part - I can bake and cook to my heart's content and she'll clean up after me. It's an excellent trade-off. It's times like these that I wonder wistfully what my life would be like if I'd followed through with culinary school. And then I gently remind myself that chef's have terrible hours, bad backs, excess flesh and that I wouldn't have my children. That's enough to bring me back to the present. To the apple pie muffins that I'm whipping up for breakfast. I'm licking the beaters and as always -when eating something so full of sugar- think about the calories I've expended during the day when I come to the realization that it's only 1 mile to the back fence line. Drat. Ah well, the beaters are licked. And my jeans still fit.

The skiers. We finally hear from them at 7:45. They are just getting into the truck after having a blast all day. Nolan was braving the moguls...time to go home! Seeing as how they're 2 hours away we decide the cake will happen without them.

Avrie falls off the couch and her arm is "loose." This is a serious matter that calls for a delicious distraction. Cut into the ugly thing. The first slice falls apart. The second as well. The third - the side falls off. The verdict? While unstable...it's certainly delicious. It's almost pretty. It's not too rich, not too sweet; it's just about right. Not unlike this life I'm living. Life is hard work. It's the most time consuming thing we'll ever do. There's instability. But, at the end of the day--it's just about right.

~Frazzled and Settled and Content~

*I say this to sound like I have some inkling to what it means to be a country girl. When, in reality, I drove a tractor once and never did farm chores. Instead, I read my way through the local library and religiously tanned in front of a fan next to the pool while drinking copious amounts of Crystal Light. In retrospect I think I was spoiled. Granted, this only lasted until I was old enough to get a job. But, still. Oh, and let's not forget the angst over that boy and that boy and this boy and that other boy. There was always that. Sigh. Oh, and I had my daily list from Mom: MT DW. W into D. I still struggle with finding joy in dishes and laundry. It's gotta be there.

**In my defense - mayo smeared all over the table is not fun to clean off. And it stinks. Gross.

***Scored me a Wilton caddy at Unique for $2.42. That's a savings of roughly $13. Go me.

****The last cup of tea I drank was in the shower. Why? Mommy was at the end of her rope. Turns out a scalding shower and a cup of double-bagged tea (the kind that will empty me in 12 hours - to make me feel in control/complete/whole/sane*.) savored until the hot water runs out is a delightful thing. I may have locked a child or two downstairs. My memory is a bit fuzzy. This was the same day that I might have said "she's being a brat...you can hit her back." But, like I said, my memory is a bit fuzzy. So, don't go calling CPS or anything. Cuz I could totally be making that up. *Admitting there's a problem is the first step to recovery. Or something. I'm aware. And I'm okay. Most of the time. It's a big ugly monster but most often I can punch back.