A Birthday and a Smile

I got a phone call last week and a very nice man was talking to me about the fact that his wife was out of the office so it was safe to call me. Now my mind first jumped to this man has a seriously wrong number, but then I realized he had called the office and had to ask for me. He identified himself but it did not help, as my mind was now trying to figure out who his wife was thinking who was not in the office that day so I could figure out this mystery. Then he said, "well you may not know this but her birthday is Thursday." The little light bulb shot off over my head, a wave of relief came over me and life was suddenly so much better. Yes, this was the husband of one of my co-workers, and as I listened I realized he was calling to see if we could arrange a cake, on the sly.

I asked the normal questions if there was a theme to the birthday, and colors etc. He said no, that she was working that night so it was just going to be her parents, and family at home, nothing special just create something she would like. Here is the kicker, the one that got me and made me get extra creative...he said, "when I asked her what she wanted for her birthday she said one of your cakes." That was it. This was going to be a great cake, it had to represent my coworker, let's call her Christy, and her sparkling personality.

So thinking away I came up with something really bright with lots of colors and shapes. Something about that didn't feel right, kinda felt like a cop out, it wasn't personal enough. I went to her partner in crime in the office to ask her but she was on the phone. So as I was working my IM screen came up and I asked one of my volunteers who knows her fairly well and she said a McDonald's cup. I thought that is perfect, and started thinking about how to do that and I thought I could do it so it was half a cup coming off the cake board, then she suggested a diet coke can in the same manner. I was leaning towards the McDonald's cup because it would be brighter but I had my construction concerns.

Over lunch that day the cake idea became cemented in stone. One of my lunch buddies suggested using round cakes to make the diet coke can, she was offering some small springform pans to help me out. At that point I was set on a diet coke can. When Christy's partner in crime, let's call her Janice, and I talked that afternoon and I ran the idea by her she loved the idea of the diet coke can. She and I were discussing flavors and decided in keeping with the diet coke theme the cake should be a chocolate cake, so butter fudge was chosen. Mind you at this point I have included many people in this secret, and so keeping it a secret was as important as getting the cake done.

Well I ended up baking about 18 inches of 6 inch round cakes. We ended up using 12 inches of cake which seemed to look right plus much more the cake would have been really lopsided. My biggest concern was grey icing. Grey icing can be depressing and it is almost impossible to make metallic icing so once I got a light grey base I started in with the colors. By the way writing sideways is kinda tough, but it is the straightest writing I have ever done. I little ribbon edge around the top and all worked well.

Christy's husband and I arranged a pickup time at my house, and knowing were she was we were in good shape. He grabbed the cake and went on to take care of the rest of her surprise eventing. That night after our program we made sure everything was picked up so we could leave in a hurry and send her home. I sat on my laptop, trying to work on homework, curious if she liked it. I got a text message about a half hour later, letting me know she had a cake and a smile.