We have a rule in my house that I don’t cook. Well, actually it is not a rule but after this you will agree with me that it should be.

Yesterday, I made a mess of epic proportions. I’m blaming Lucy and her inability to stop growing older. She’s turning four next month (pass the vodka, thank you) and wanted “a ballerina cake with pink and purple”. I tried very hard not to laugh in her face and told her maybe we should start with cupcakes, and we’ll see how we go for the rest.

I am not creative. I cannot draw, paint, cook, bake or anything else remotely “fun”.

We made cupcakes. They overflowed into the pan, they were lopsided and sort of resembled toadstools that had been stepped on by a small furry animal. Oh, and they bounced. They were not pretty. My first experience with fondant nearly killed me. It’s sticky! And blah, and whine whine whine!

I coloured different parts of fondant. I had grand ideas, ‘yo. We muddled through, and salvaged about five of the cupcakes, the rest were too close to charcoal to be of any edible use. We decorated. They looked.. average. They tasted worse. But Lucy was ecstatic. She had decided what she wanted for her party, she wants her friends to do their own cupcake decorating. My kid, the genius. I am totally off the hook.

Now, the clean up.  The part that I hate even more than the actual cooking.. It was going well. Lucy was nagging me, Oliver was screaming, there was fondant glued to the bench and the sterilizer was full of freshly cleaned and sterilized bottles. (Remember that, it’s important).  Dishes went into the washer, pans were scrubbed and drained and then, catastrophe.

I picked up the bottles of food dye. There were five bottles. I picked up four, just fine. The final bottle, the pillar box red didn’t go so well. I grabbed it by the lid, spun around to walk across the kitchen when the lid clean came off in my hand. The bottle did a 360 in the air, spewing bright red concentrated food colouring all over my one year old, stain free kitchen. It was dripping from the overhead cabinets, running down the walls, all over the benches, the dishwasher, the floor and I even managed to get it INSIDE the sterilizer, through the vents and all over the freshly washed, and sterilized bottles. Lucy went into immediate hysterics. The kid laughed until she couldn’t breathe. Oliver who had been temporarily placated with his dummy started howling as though he had been abandoned, not left on the lounge-room floor for five minutes. Molly came to investigate. I chased her out, and walked in the dye. Great. Now there are blood red footprints along with food dye dripping off every surface in my usually pristine kitchen.

You guys, it took me FORTY MINUTES to clean up the dye I could see. That stuff is brutal. It soaked into the grout in the tiles, it took me another two hours to flush that clear. And of course the problem with food dye is that when you add water, it dilutes and SPREADS. I used three rolls of paper towel and every last ounce of self control to not go screaming down the street. Meanwhile, Oliver is screaming, Lucy wants to eat the charcoal cupcakes, the cat keeps wandering in trying to get all up in the dye because it might be water, there is someone knocking on the door “I’m not answering it, but they so know we’re in here, since they can SEE through the open door!” and the phone is ringing. And then I had to re-wash and re-sterilize the bottles. Probably the worst part of this whole sorry saga! Oh, and I still have one red foot, and red hands and arms. I is sexy.

Next time I’ll save myself the hassle, and just burn the house along with the cupcakes. (Next time.. yeah, right!)

**Also, check me out over at ToyBoxTales, talking about sleep with a newborn, or the lack of it!**