let them eat cake

On the eve of Hank and George's birthday, I decided I would not have time to make a cake, or two.  So I called my local grocery store where I knew they gave free cakes to one-year olds on their birthdays.  

"Free?  Only if you purchase a quarter sheet cake or half sheet cake, which right now is the same price as the quarter sheet.  And you have twins? No. Only one free cake."  

That's pretty much how the woman on the phone presented it to me.  I wanted to ask if I could order 2 quarter sheets, get charged for a half sheet, which, on special, is the same price as one quarter, and get 2 free baby cakes. Buy 2 cakes, get 2 free baby cakes, right? 

But make no mistake, I would not be getting 2 free anything, that was clear in the tone of her voice.

So I drove down later that day and found a lone older man at the bakery.  He was not a baker, or cake decorator, just putting in his time to restock the bagels and take the occasional order.
I decided I would just buy 2 baby cakes, since we are not big cake eaters anyway.  For $6.99 x 2, I was happy to not have to stress about making cakes the next day, when I still had to get ready for the grandparents to come over, clean my house, wrap presents, make dinner, make birthday banners and take care of the birthday boys.  Yes, this was still too good to be true, free or not.

I ordered 2 all white mini cakes.  And asked for "Happy Birthday Hank/George!" on the tops, in another color.  I watched him write up the order. Simple simple.

Maybe too simple.  Imagine my shock when I returned the next day to pick up these not-so-white cakes:  blue with purple, yellow and green balloons?  What?

The man who took my order was there again.  He opened the boxes and admitted sheepishly, "This isn't what you ordered, is it?"

Me:  "No."

Him:  "I don't know what happened.  The decorator was our girl in training and I guess she did not follow the order."

Me:  "No, she didn't."

Him:  "Well, do you still want them?"

Me:  "Not really, but my twins' birthday party is in one hour. I have no choice."  

At this point I paused, waiting for him to offer to have the not-in-training cake decorator quickly redo them, or at least offer to give me the cakes for free.  The man paused right along with me, waiting for me to make the next move.  I should have taken control, Emily-style.  She [my sister] would have visited the manager and taken those cakes home free of charge, without blinking an eye.  But I did not have the time, nor the composure to face that conflict.  So I paid the man, and went on my way.

It makes for a funny story, but my complaints still stand:

A) Why is it so hard to follow directions?  

B) Don't grocery stores know it's really good p.r. to give the mini cake away for free, especially to their loyal customers?  People are not going to dishonestly take advantage of the free cake offer.  They're just not.  And if they do, it's maybe a $0.75 cake.

C)  Why would the bakery man not intuitively know to just give me the cakes for FREE?  

D)  Blue and green frosting is really messy!!!!

Enough of that.  On to the rest of the photos:

This is pre-cake gift-opening.

 Did I mention George is walking?  Everywhere.

 Post-cake and post-bath pjs [yep, I told you we'd use those costumes again].