Hey, Hey, It’s a Monkey

This monkey tried to kill me:

I’m being serious. It may look all cute and homemade, but don’t be fooled. It is evil.

When I woke up on Saturday morning I felt as though death would be preferable. My lungs felt charred and my head felt like it was on fire. You know, just a bit under the weather. So a normal person says, “well, the two year old will not know if I just send her dad to the store to buy some cheap-o cupcakes for her birthday.”

I am not a normal person.

I am fueled by mother guilt. The third baby, the one that I haven’t even bought a gift for, needs a homemade cake. Otherwise, she’ll grow up and become a heroine addict/stripper/Glen Beck fan. I am totally rational at this point.

It has to be a monkey cake. Why would I just bake a square cake and put frosting on it? It’s just layers right? It’s just a 2 layer cake, filled with cream cheese frosting, a cinnamon chocolate fudgy glaze and some ears. And a smaller smashcake. Dutch needs a smashcake, because that’s always a good idea.

MB figures out that I am not taking suggestions and secrets the kids away in a haze.

I start sifting flour, sugar, cocoa. I’m sifting. I’m sifting. It’s been five hours of sifting, I’m sure.

Finally some batter. I curse several times at the rolling up edges of parchment rounds. I manage to remember the layers before they get burned.

I meet disaster at every corner and shake his hand vigorously. No, it was the layers that I shook vigorously and nearly broke five zillion times.

What do monkey ears really look like? I’m pretty sure I can handle the frozen layers with a sharp knife. I’ll just free hand it. The smashcake monkey has ear issues. As in, it’s a monkey cobra.

Must improve big cake ear situation.

Please, Google, help me and show me some images to guide my poor uncreative knife hand!

No! No! Don’t ever show me the real life monkey cake that poops raisinets – i just threw up in my mouth!

I have monkey like cake shapes. I have frosting. I don’t remember making frosting. I have no desire to go on. There’s no going back. I will die before I finish making this cake.

Let the major assemblage begin. It is a miracle the circle layers are intact. Especially after I unrolled the one wrapped in plastic like I was pulling a table cloth off a table. I should definitely try to work faster.

Frosting in the middle. Easy. Plop. Smooth. Plop top on. Squish. Shouldn’t I be done?

The chocolate frosting – there’s not enough. It’s too sticky. I have to rinse my spreader in hot water with every single stroke. Every single one. For the entire cake. It’s okay, I am powered on by the thought of the inevitable sound that Dutch will produce when she sees it – ooh, ooh, ahh, ahh!

I don’t have pastry tubes. But in a mad stroke of genius I find medication syringes that should fill up nicely. I remember that my decorating skills peaked in 1st grade.

Mb and the kids reappear. It took me all day to make the monkey cake. All day.

It took 5 minutes to slice it up and eat it.

I hate you monkey cake. I hate your smugly monkey face. You got what you deserved.