For the love of Barney!

Don't ask me why, but for some reason, out of the white snowy sky, (yes it's snowing here), I feel like blogging today. Hmm, wonder if it could have anything to do with the fact that right now I have no kids, no husband, no house to clean or bills to pay, and no job to do. Yep, I am in a hotel Starbucks sipping a Nonfat Gingerbread latte and totally enjoying this rare quiet time to myself with no other obligations. Todd has been in Grand Rapids for Farm Bureau meetings this week, and yesterday I pawned the kids off on my mother in law and drove up to do some shopping and have dinner and stay the night. Todd has meetings again this morning and then we will head back to life with obligations, after making a quick stop at Costco.

Christmas is coming so fast, I can't believe it. I still haven't gotten a tree or started my shopping. I really need to get on the ball. Yesterday I had planned to do some shopping, but by the time I got to Grand Rapids I only had time for one stop. The cake store. Let me explain...
This Monday is Tony's 2nd birthday, and for his cake I wanted a Barney cake. Not just a cake with a picture of Barney on it, but I wanted the actual cake to look like Barney. My MIL has a friend who made an Elmo cake, which I saw on Facebook and it was so cute, looked just like him. I asked her if she could make me a Barney one, which of course she could, only problem being she does not have a Barney cake pan. So determined woman that I am when I get my mind set on something, I did some Amazon searching and sure enough found a Barney cake pan, for $19.99 plus $9 shipping. Since it was Thursday and the party is Sunday, I wasn't sure that it would arrive in time. Since I knew I was coming to GR for the day I called a cake store and found out that they had a Barney pan to rent but not sell. Well GR is a good hour + drive and the rental is for 2 days only so I wasn't sure that would work either. Todd has another Farm show to attend in GR next week, so I asked if there was anyway we could keep it for a week. She started chuckling on the phone, and then proceeded to tell me that the last time the pan had been rented was in 2005, so she was pretty sure a week would be just fine. "I guess Barney isn't that popular" she said. Well maybe not, but to my Tony, he is #1. Everyday we must watch Barney, many, many, many times. I have several episodes saved on the DVR so we can watch it anytime he wants/demands and he knows it. He will bring me the remote control and say "Barney". If I ignore him or pretend I didn't hear him, he just says it louder and louder until I give in and turn it on. We try telling him that Barney is sleeping sometimes, but that doesn't work too well. I don't really like Barney myself, but he has a good message for kids, teaching them to play nice and morals and all that stuff, so I guess if he wants to watch it he can. I just wish he liked other cartoons too, for a little variety.
Anyway, back to the cake, so I get to the store and I walk in and the whole place smells so good, apparently it's not just a cake store, but a cake bakery too and the aroma from the frosting and cakes baking in the back filled the store. I think it had a hypnotizing effect on me, cause when I got there I did something totally crazy! First of all the cake pan was not at all what I had wanted, it was more like a cake with Barney on it, and I really wanted the cake to be Barney! So I started looking around the store to see what else they had, they had all kinds of cool kids cake pans. I tried to look and see if there was anything else that I could get to take back to the cake baker to make for him and I spotted a CARS cake pan. Tony does love CARS, so I decided that I would buy the pan. And then I started thinking crazy, how hard can it be to decorate a cake, it had a picture on it for me to use as a guide, why do I need to pay someone else to do this when I can do it myself? I asked the lady what she thought about it, I told her that I had helped my sister decorate a cake many years ago and we used a star tip. She said if I could use a star tip then I would be just fine. So I bought all the frosting dye colors, frosting tips, couplings, bags, and clear vanilla, butter and almond flavorings. I walked out of the store feeling really excited about making this cake, but as soon as I got out of the store and into my car, I started having doubts. (That is why I say the store smells had me hypnotized.) So I will probably most definitely be calling my sisters to help me. Hopefully we can pull it off and make a nice cake, but I still think I might go ahead and have the cake baker make me an Elmo cake too (just in case)!

Wish me luck! I promise to post pictures of the cake and party afterwards!