How to Throw a Birthday Party for your Dog

So here you are, looking for information on how to throw a party for your four-legged child, aka your dog.

First, Acknowledge.
It is important to recognize that you are crazy.  Awesome, creative, and loving... but crazy.  Don't worry, no judgement here.  Just acknowledge where you are. In crazy town.

Second, cake.  
I found a lot of recipes online for cake that could be consumed by dogs and humans (usually something like "peanut butter carrot cake".)  That sounded disgusting to me.  Instead I went the route of "making my guests uncomfortable because my cake just *looks* like something dogs eat." aka, dog food cake.  It's Reese's cereal and it looks pretty gross! It was chocolate cake underneath, which you should definitely not share with your birthday children.

"Dog food Cake" for people!

And then of course, you need cake for the guests of honor.  It's important to remember that your guests of honor might need a couple extra bathroom breaks after the party, since you gave them filet mignon dog food which they are not quite used to eating, but thought was delicious.

"Cake" for dogs!

"Nom nom we love cake"

Third, presents.
Dogs may not know how to open presents, but if you loosely tape them and put food inside, they will figure it out pretty quickly.

"Oh, we get it!"

Finally: hats!
And then the most important element of doggy birthdays. Dogs in hats!  AAahhhh!!

"Why do you do this to us, mom?"

 Make sure you take several pictures as quickly as you can, because dogs don't seem to like hats nearly as much as you do.

Happy 1st birthday to Jazz and 5th birthday to Tolpel! :) And thanks to my family (husband, parents, sister, and brother in law) for attending my ridiculous party.

Domestic Endeavors

Well, I just had to write a post to brag about my first domestic diva win!! I made a wreath!! Entirely out of a metal coathanger, some flowers from the dollar store, and packing tape! And it looks awesome! I'm hoping to find a wreath hanger tonight, but in the mean time:


And then we had birthday cake situation. You know what, I'm going to call it a win. Sure, the cake was a box mix. Sure, the frosting came from the store. And yeah, the cake did have a giant gap in the side between the layers.. but for the first time ever, I made a cake, leveled it (or attempted to), and decorated it, without crying, throwing a temper tantrum, or needing Jake to come rescue me and the cake! And how diva is it, if you're always falling apart anyway?

So see, friends? If even I can have an occasional success, so can you.

cake!

I would like to begin by explaining the fate of my previous 3 two-layer cakes.

Cake one was a mountain dew pineapple cake (yay Cake Doct0r) for my mom's birthday. The cake fell and so the pineapple topping was more like soup in a cake bowl. It tasted yummy though.

Cake two was a box birthday cake for my sweet husband. I had just gotten my icing tips and I wanted to make something beautiful. It ended up breaking in half, and while I was slathering icing over the crumbs to "put it back together" and sobbing, while occasionally falling in the middle of the floor.... Jacob finally took it from me and threw it away.

Cake three was another Cake Doctor attempt - this time at a Strawberry cake, for my mother in law's birthday. This one not only got the soup bowl effect, but it tasted like strawberry powdered milk. Not my best evening...

So onward to cake four. I decided to offer to bring a carrot cake to my grandmother's house for Easter, because I had seen this very cute decorating video on allrecipes.com that I wanted to try. Given the fate of my previous three cakes, I thought I'd do a trial run this weekend, and if it succeeded, take it to a friend's party later.

Yaaaaay!!! (Note, my husband has insinuated that objects in pictures may actually be less lovely than they appear.)

But I would just like to proudly state that this cake is totally covered in frosting, the carrots resemble carrots and there is no huge dip in the center. I win the cake making game. :)

And if you'd like them, here are the recipes for Carrot Cake, and colored frosting (although the frosting was a little slippery... and a how to decorate video.