Man Cake

I wanted to make a cake for a bachelorette party that featured a man in a bed. In the toy aisle of Walmart, I found several action figures that were very muscular and manly, but they had clothes molded/ painted on. The guy in my Man Cake would not have on full fighting gear!

I needed a topless guy, one that could possibly be naked, or wearing boxers. I walked over to the wrestler section, and bingo! shirtless men!

If I ever get the opportunity to make a cake for gay bachelors,

these are the guys I'll use.

A good choice- shirtless, and though only my friend Kevin C. would wear jeans and a belt to bed, this could work.

Then I noticed most, if not all the wrestlers have what I call a "masturbation hand"; an open fist positioned near the vicinity of this activity. Why do they have this? In other action figures, it's to hold weapons such as spears, swords, guns... but wrestlers do not take any such items into the ring with them. Occam's razor suggests that instead of smuggling weapons into the ring, these wrestlers spend quite a bit of private time in the locker room.

See what I mean?

This is the guy I chose for the cake, because he bore a slight resemblance to the groom.

Measuring for size. I wish he wouldn't wear his boots in the bed like that.

Cake was frosted with chocolate mousse frosting, then the fondant fitted sheet was put on. Marshmallow pillows help him find a comfortable, yet sexy sleeping position. Chocolate headboard was made by pouring melted chocolate into the bottom of a gladware container.

Fondant quilted coverlet, and more pillows. My husband teases me about my "nesting pod" of a thousand pillows, but when it comes to pillows, more is more.

And more pillows!

Ready to party!

Two Random Thoughts

Something about my kids, an anvil and a rubber mallet...

My no-stick pan will now only be no-stick if I no-cook in it!

Walmart's new line of plus-size jewelry, spawning "yo momma" jokes across the nation:

"Yo momma so fat she wear plus size earrings!"

Arts and Crap

The time had come to organize the closet under the stairs, and the art cabinets. My family has become the default to absorb all our friends' and family's "retail therapy".

An example: Every year, Walmart drops the price of their backpacks to $1 a couple weeks after school starts (they put Back-to-School stuff out in July, so I assume this price drop is to make room for Christmas merchandise). At only $1, that price is too good for all our friends and family to pass up, so they buy several styles and colors. When I say, "We don't really need backpacks, though..." they say, "It was only a dollar. And you never know when one will come in handy!"

So I take them home and put them in the big bag under the stairs, with the ones from last year, and the year before...

The kids treat them as disposable. If they are too lazy to unpack their backpack, they just grab another one from the closet. Weeks and months later, I open up 20 backpacks and sort through dirty clothes, rotted food, and find the missing mp3 player, the retainer, the lost homework, the library book we already paid for in fines...

Expand this idea for marked-down Easter decorations, 'extra' Christmas trees, coloring books, diaper bags (my 'baby' is ten!), craft supplies, beads, fingerpaint, fabric, t-shirts, party supplies, placemats, artificial houseplants, pillow stuffing, plaster, quilt batting... and various "mostly finished" projects that people think I have the copious free time to complete.

"You never know... a long winter night, by the fire, you might need a little project like this latch-hook rug to pass the time. I already got all the black done on it."

Long winter night? By the fire? Do I look like Caroline Ingalls?!

Closet under the stairs, Before

Art table, Before

Along the way, I discovered...

Glitter really is the STD of arts & crafts; it gets on everything, it never goes away, it spreads to everything you touch and it's very hard to get rid of. You can tell everywhere you've been in the room after touching it just once. And everybody has a random, because it's even on my Q-tips and toothbrush.

Anyone who gives a mom with five kids a 5lb bag of beads has no soul.

Pom-poms breed in dark corners. With pipe cleaners. They make baby felt squares.

It was suggested that I have a give-away table at my next social event. It's risky. Folks might recognize their stuff. They'd be all, "Hey! You can't give this away! I dumped this crap on you out of the kindness of my heart!"

So, for now I'm sorting into piles, and burying stuff deep when no one is looking.

Closet under the stairs, After

Closet under the stairs, After

Art table, After

Art Room, After

Art supplies, After