Monday, August 31, 2015

Reveal Cake #FAIL


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Flashback to a few weeks ago when my mom asked me if I wanted to have a gender reveal party for the baby...

My first thought was that I wasn't interested but then I thought.... well I do really like cake so.... maybe?

Once I gave her the yellow light of a maybe she let her imagination run wild.  Before I knew it, she was planning a party where we would FaceTime friends and family across the country.  And we would mail them all petit fours (mini cakes) with the blue or pink on the inside for them all to enjoy while they watched us cut the cake for the reveal over 1000 miles away.

The more I thought about it though, the more it just didn't feel like me (or my husband).  First of all - I'm a data/input person.  If there is information out there I want to know it RIGHT NOW.  I don't have the patience to wait for a party and for a baker to make a cake to find out something like this.

I also thought about how I really want to stay away from using the term gender at this point (really we were just learning the baby's sex) so what would we even call the party?  "Sex Party" doesn't have quite the connotation we would be looking for...

My mom suggested we call it a "Blue or Pink Party" but then that brings up a whole slew of other issues I have with pushing gender stereotypes on our children and the consumer culture of pink vs. blue for children.  (Yes, Mom, I know it can be exhausting to be my mother but at least I have convictions!)

So at that point we put the reveal party idea behind us.  I told my husband about my mom's ideas and he immediately said "no - that's not us."  We may have a party to celebrate this baby's impending arrival but it will be just that - a gathering of friends to celebrate Tater Tot.

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Now to the day we actually found out Tater Tot is a boy.  I already shared the corny, but sweet way I shared the news with my husband here.

My mom called to to find out if I had heard and again I just didn't feel right telling her over the phone so I told her I knew but wasn't ready to tell her.  I had to make her squirm a little, you know.  She actually threw an "it's not like I gave birth to you or anything" at me, but I held strong and didn't let on.

I called my husband and we hatched a plan to give my mom the reveal cake she wanted.  I invited her to over for dessert and stopped at two different stores to find cake mix and blue food coloring (yes, I have convictions but I also was short on time to come up with any other ideas and I knew my mom would enjoy it).

And thus begins the creation of the ugliest reveal cake in the history of reveal cakes...


It started out well enough...

That's me: Suzy Homemaker.  Ahem.
We had our bright, blue cake batter ready and even cooked perfectly.  Then we tried to transfer the cake....

Oops.  :-/
Okay - we can work with this.  Let's just cut it into a smaller cake and ice it.  No big deal!

This is going from bad to worse... The blue from the cake came through the icing, and I made the mistake of heating up the icing in the microwave to make it more spreadable but instead turned it into liquid icing.  

Sigh.

Should've bought an extra tub of icing.

Thankfully I got the funfetti cake so the sprinkles helped camouflage the blue and well... maybe helped make it look a little better?  Maybe....



At least it tasted good!  Any my mom got her "reveal party" after all.

Yum.




Thursday, August 20, 2015

And it's a......!

This week we found out the sex of this little baby (Tater Tot To Be)!


Unlike with our first (FrenchFry), when my husband and I found out together during our 18 week ultrasound, this time we found out through a phone call based on a blood test done at 14 weeks.  It's amazing to see the medical advancements in just a few years between pregnancies.

I got the news over the phone while I was working from home and my husband was at work.  I just didn't feel right telling him the news through a text or phone call so I hatched a last minute plan to surprise him at work.

I quickly ran over to the grocery store to get some flowers and to find something to help me share the news.  And I settled on some petit fours that had the familiar color (I'm not too into the blue is for boys and pink is for girls thing, but I  like convenience and this was the easiest plan I could hatch in the few minutes I had).

I drove over to my husband's office and texted him from the parking lot that I got the call.  He immediately called me back and said "Aaaaaannnnnnndddddd????"  So I told him to come outside.

And then I gave him the bag with the petit fours to open and inside he found...


Tater Tot is a BOY!!!

The plan was a bit corny but it in reality it was also very special and sweet.  My husband was very surprised by the visit and it was great to be able to tell him the news in person.

I don't know why but I've always thought I would be the mother of boys.  And now that's going to be true!  TWO boys!  And FrenchFry is going to have a little brother.  We can't wait until this little guy is here and have our two little boys together.

Parents of BOYS.  :-)


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Tuesday, August 4, 2015

We're Going to Need More Ketchup!


Big news in KetchupLand...

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FrenchFry is going to be a BIG BROTHER! 



I am so excited to be able to share that I'm 14 weeks pregnant with my second child!  It has been really hard to keep this news from the blog for the past 10 weeks.  (Somehow those 10 weeks have both flown by and seemed to crawl at a snail's pace at the same time.)  It has also caused me to have total writer's block as I couldn't find anything to write about except for the ONE THING I COULDN'T TALK ABOUT.

But we are ready to share our happy and exciting news with the world, and boy do I have some stuff to say about being pregnant a second time!  Expect to hear a lot more from me as we prepare to go from one kid to two and navigate pregnancy with a high energy toddler in the house.  (Spoiler Alert: It's exhausting!)

FrenchFry has NO IDEA what is coming!


Say Hello to Tater Tot:

Expected Arrival: January 2016




And of course like any good family photo shoot, there were outtakes.  :-)






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