The perfect mommy/daughter moment… NOT

I always imagine these Norman Rockwell moments with my kids when I am the perfect, patient, organized Mom and my children look at me with rapt attention as I impart wonderful bits of wit and wisdom. Unfortunately, real life never really lives up to my dreams and I was reminded of this a few days ago.

Naamua Delaney, one of the other hosts of iVillage Live, was having a birthday and I volunteered to bring the cake. I had worked late the day before and was feeling very guilty and my five-year-old was giving me those soulful looks that scream, “My Mommy likes her job more than me.” I realized that the cake could create some excellent “quality time” so instead of buying a cake at a bakery, we would bake one. Perfect! We went to the grocery store and picked out a mix… yes, when I say bake I mean a box and a couple of eggs, the perfect frosting (in a can) and several tubes of icing to create the multitude of flowers she wanted on the cake. We were talking and laughing and I was very pleased with my idea and feeling so good about my parenting skills. I promised that this would be her cake to make and decorate and really, that is how it all began. She pulled her stool up to the counter and poured in the powder batter, oil, water and eggs. She was stirring and laughing and I let her lick the spoon before the eggs went in, of course, so that my precious baby would not be exposed to the salmonella lurking in the eggs that I had eaten without difficulty my entire childhood. Oh yes, we moms today must be far more vigilant than our own mothers.

We greased the pan and things were still Betty Crocker beautiful. We popped the cake in the oven and hugged. After the requisite 35 minutes, we tested our cake with a toothpick and it was fluffy and light. Now unfortunately, I tend to be impatient and the time when a cake is cooling always seems like a waste to me. I decided to move things along, but when I flipped it carefully out of the pan, it was suddenly in three pieces. At this point I am starting to stress and the small child asking, “Mommy, why do we want the cake broken?” is not helping. I am starting to see my co-workers saying, “Man, is that Molly a lousy cook.”

I managed to reassemble the cake like a jigsaw puzzle and decided that perhaps we should leave it for a while to cool… better late than never. While we were gone, either my dad or one of the cats ate two sizable bites out of the cake. I personally believe it was my father but when I started screaming, he said it was the cat. Seriously, I have never seen a cat eat chocolate cake, but my Dad said that was his story and he was sticking to it. There was no time to make another cake so we decided the frosting would hide all problems and I wouldn’t tell anyone about the possible feline disaster. I am now semi-freaking out, ready for this cake to just go away, and furious that Naamua’s mother gave birth to her on this day. It is at this point that my daughter grabs a knife and brushes the white frosting through the black cake pulling up tiny bits of cake and making a mess.

My beautiful bonding moment is down the tubes as I scream, “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO Mom will frost the cake.” All I needed was a coat hanger in my hand and the “Mommy Dearest” moment would have been complete. I suddenly realized that this was one of those crystallizing moments where priorities MUST be addressed. In the end, I took a deep breath, put my pride aside and let my five-year-old decide the decorations. The cake had too many flowers and lots of black spots of frosting, but my daughter was smiling and I learned, somewhat belatedly, that I would rather try to be a good Mom than a good baker.

Comments

Yeah, I've been there. Perfections is hard to let go of, particularly public perfection.

Now, I stick to brownies and cupcakes--much harder to mess up.

Wow..I've had those "Mommy Dearest" moments. That made me LOL!!

I think everyone has had these moments, and looking back on them with my daughter they are joy. Now that my son and I are going thru this again its so much easier to just go with the flow!

Thnx for this article. It tells me to be a good mom not a good baker... i'm one of the perfectionist person out there...

Thanks for your story!!! Makes me feel a whole lot better about trying to make everything just so to no avail!!!

It's always so much better when you can sit back, laugh and enjoy the moment once in a while!! I'm just going to "let it happen tonite"!!