Wednesday, January 16, 2008

You Gotta Fight....

For your right to Par-tay!

Apparently you do in Texas.

Why is it so hard to organize a fricking birthday party around here?

When Jacob turned one, the Kroger forgot to put in the order for his birthday cake. Never mind that I ordered it two damn months in advance. Thank goodness I went in the day before to check on it or else he would have been cakeless on his first birthday! Ever since, I am so on top of the birthday crap it ain't even funny.

For Jacob's third birthday we planned a huge bash at G*mboree and paid the bill six months in advance to secure the date. Two weeks before the hugely anticipated G*mbo Clown Fest, we showed up for a weekly class to find the doors chained and a sign informing us that it was closed effective immediately. WTF? Those a-holes took my kid's college tuition and fled town. Seriously. The chick who owned the place went batshit and didn't leave a forwarding address. I went semi-insane myself trying to throw together a party in my postage stamp sized backyard after all the invitations had been mailed out. G*mbo has a starting position on my shit list.

So, Adam has a birthday next week. I found Diego party supplies at my favorite grocery store back in September for fifteen cents a package and stocked up. He's not obsessed with anything the way Jacob was with Thomas (three Thomas birthdays in a row) but he enjoys that show, he loves the color orange and it was all so cheap so he's having a Diego party. Well, that crap was cheap for a reason. Apparently Diego parties are passe. I've been all over town trying to find a place that will bake a Diego cake for me. I can get a John Deere cake or an American Idol cake but no Diego cake. What's up with that? Have the cake bakers not seen the toy aisles? Diego has his own aisle at the Tarjhay for cripes sake. Why is there no cake???? I did find one store that had a picture of one in their grubby little display book and when I finally got the lady there to wait on me and told her I wanted the coveted Diego cake as shown was told simply, no.

Me: I'd like to order this cake please.
Bakery Bitch: No
Me: Do you have the things to make this cake?
Bakery Bitch: No
Me: Can you check to see if you can make this cake, SINCE YOU'RE ADVERTISING IT AND ALL?
Bakery Bitch: (Turns around and rifles through some stuff for half a second) No
Me: I don't need it for another two weeks can you order it from another store because they've done that for me before.
Bakery Bitch: No
Me: Can I speak with the Bakery manager?
Bakery Bitch: No
Me: Maybe you should rip the picture out of your little booklet, Lady, to avoid being bothered in the future Okay then.

Well, I finally found a hoity-toity bakery that will bake a Diego cake for like a trillion dollars and I was able to order it and get that out of the way yesterday morning. I lied to my husband about the price and used the Christmas money my mom gave me to pay for it, but dammit, he'll have that cake!

I was feeling such relief over that expensive cake when on the way home from the bakery Adam said, "No Diego cake Mommy. Shrek cake. Shrek party. No Diego party."

All. Day. Long. he talked about a Shrek party. There would be Shrek and Donkey and Dragon and, Geez Louise, let us not forget Gingy. It would've been nice to know how much he loved Shrek, uh, like last week.

So now I am on the hunt for a Shrek cake. Or Shrek cupcakes. Or some kind of damn Shrek decorations I can stick on his cake on his actual birthday because we have come to that compromise. Diego on Saturday, Shrek on Wednesday.

I think I hate Diego. And maybe Shrek too.

And to think I get to plan another party six weeks from now.

And six weeks after that.

Oh joy.

11 comments:

SydneyDawn said...

Planning a child's birthday party is about the most stressful experience I've ever had the misfortune of going through. I don't know how many times the bakery has spelled my son's name wrong - but it's so many that I refuse to even have it put on the cake anymore.

Hope you make it through!

Aunt Becky said...

I hate having my kids birthday parties. I paid someone to do it last year for Ben, for the first time ever, and I couldn't have been happier.

Good luck. I'm staring down Alex's first birthday (what? Already??) and am already shaking in my boots.

Sarah said...

OMG...Birthdays are far more stressful than the holidays.

But WTH was up with that lady at the bakery?!?! If it's in the book they CAN make it...they jsut have to order the decorations.

Heck, if you lived closer I'd get a Diego pie pan and bake a stupid cake for you :D Because Diego is NOT passe. Just ask my screaming fan girl...er, daughter.

ChupieandJ'smama (Janeen) said...

Birthday parties bl_w. My older son's party is at "American Bouncers". I never heard of this until a boy at his school had his party there. $300.00 later and we are having ours there too. At least they do the pizza, snacks, decorations, etc, but still. And he wanted a "Lego party". We don't have that around here either. And after what I spent on the place, I wasn't ordering it. So he's having generic party stuff supplied by American Bouncers and $1.00 "dog" invitations from the bargin bin at "Party Express". Parents could go broke on these things!! We haven't got to the cake yet. Lord help me.....

Amie said...

I don't do bday parties anymore. 5 a year is just too many. The boys seem fine with tiny family parties.

tracey.becker1@gmail.com said...

Sweetie, get some Shrek figurines, put them on a regular old cake from a box, and voila! A Shrek cake. For like, $10.

Mommy Daisy said...

OH man, we have a birthday coming up in about 6 weeks. Reading this is making me stress now. Yikes. I hope it all works out for you.

Lynsey said...

oh gosh, is this what i have to look forward to?!?!

Miss Hope said...

Wonder what kind of time I'm going to have in April when I have to find THE POWER RANGER WONDER PETS BEN TEN WOW WOW WUBZY cake?

Burgh Baby said...

We? Are so very different. Alexis' birthday is next Sunday. I have ZERO plans to date. ZERO. I've thought about it a couple of times, but I'll figure it out between now and then.

Of course, when she's five, she may force me to actually plan ahead. Then I'll be hunting you down and asking for pointers.

:-)

Kether said...

I laughed so hard when I read this because when I came home with all the Cars crap Liam said, "no mama! Hotwheels!"
So i got some hotwheels stickers and stuck them on stuff.

Hope you all had a great birthday Saturday, too! (I think you said that the party was today...)