After careful examination I have determined that 63% of my parenting is motivated by guilt. I feel guilty about that. I have also discovered, though, that while guilt isn’t the healthiest of inspirations, it can sometimes lead me to a positive place. For example…
“Ugh, I feel so guilty for feeding my kids donuts and hot chocolate for breakfast. I’m going to make them a chicken salad and fresh fruit for lunch.”
See? Less than stellar parenting leads to guilt which leads to positive decisions making!
Here’s another example….
“Man I feel guilty about letting my kids watch 4 hours of television today. We are going to spend the rest of the afternoon riding bikes and playing soccer at the park.”
Again, iffy parenting initiates guilty feelings which in turn inspires wise choices.
Sadly, guilt-induced parenting does not always have positive outcomes.
Let me tell you the story of a guilt-driven trip to craft store with 2 kids on Black Friday. The end result being this clusterf%*k of craftery…
What the ever loving hell are those, you ask?
Read on, my friends, read on…
It all began on Thanksgiving night. Sweet sweet Nate informed me he couldn’t play any fun apps because his iTouch4 was too old.
I felt guilty about his lackluster iTouch. So I lent him my iPad for the evening and bought a few fun apps to make him happy and relieve my guilt. They were not educational apps. That made me feel guilty.
2 hours later he enthusiastically returned, eager to share this brilliant find:
Nate: Isn’t this awesome, Mom? Can we make these tomorrow?
Me: Uh, those look pretty complicated, buddy. I don’t think we can make them.
Nate: Oh, OK. I guess I’ll just watch the video over and over.
*exits room sulking & dejected*
Me: GUILT
By the time Black Friday dawns, guilt had been boiling in my veins for approximately 13 hours and I just couldn’t take it any longer. I was determined to be a FUN MOM who CRAFTS and is not afraid to FLY BY THE SEAT OF HER PANTS and tackle some cake pops. Truly, how hard can it be, right?
So to the craft store we go!! This should be easy- Me, 2 kids and eleventy-thousand other people shopping on Black Friday. What could go wrong? After searching for 30 minutes because the store has been completely rearranged for Christmas crafting, I gathered the necessary items, it was now time to stand in line to purchase our Cake Pop materials.
Have you ever stood in line with 2 children at a craft store on Black Friday? It’s not pleasant, I assure you. Fortunately after 21 minutes and countless “This line is so slow” and “These bags of melting chocolate are so heavy” we finally made it to the register to pay for our loot only to discover… I forgot my freaking wallet at home!
Now some people would take this as a sign and abort the mission. But not me! I am FUN SPONTANEOUS CRAFT MOM, remember? I will not give in! I have FUN and GUILT on my side, remember?
And so we left our items and my dignity at the register and ventured home to find my wallet with the hope of returning to make our cake pop purchases. For one brief moment in time, luck was on our side and the wallet was exactly where I remembered leaving it: next to my bed after having bought Nate a few new apps on my iPad because I felt guilty about his lack of app awesomeness the previous night.
A hop, skip and a jump later we were back in line with 53 other people at the craft store- without terribly heavy items such as lollipop sticks weighing us down, thank the good Lord! After ringing up the wrong bag of items someone else left behind the register, the correct items were finally purchased and we were on our way home for Cakepoppalooza!!
Not so fast, ladies and gentlemen. We came upon this when we returned home…What could this possibly be? It’s the remnants of an 11×17 stone wear pan that was once full of homemade mac & cheese.
I’ll give you one guess who broke the pan and ate the mac & cheese…
I may be going out on a limb here, but I’m willing to bet you guessed correctly.
So let’s recap, shall we? Guilt over crappy app choices. Guilt over not wanting to be FUN MOM who follows YouTube videos and makes Cake Pops. Trip to craft store on Black Friday with 2 kids in tow. Forgot wallet. Return home to retrieve wallet. Return to craft store on Black Friday with same 2 kids in tow. Wait in giant line. Twice. Purchase items. Return home to find mac & cheese apocalypse.
Still haven’t started making freaking cake pops.
I will use pictures to share the events of the next 24 hours- Yes, you read that correctly… 24 freaking hours!
Cake Balls were made.
Ask me how many “balls” jokes were made. Go ahead, ask me.
Enough to make me yell, “If someone else makes a joke about balls were are DONE!”
Cake Pop Template and Supplies were gathered
Directions were meticulously followed
Wellllll…. maybe not “meticulously”
WTF is this?
Balls were refrigerated (giggle snort), melting chocolates were melted, cake balls were dipped, cake balls fell apart, cake balls were re-refrigerated, cake balls were re-dipped, and 4 hours later we had this… Voila!
Yup, just this.
One. Stinking. Monster. Cake Pop. And now it’s time for bed.
Day 2 begins…
Lollipop sticks- check
Melting chocolates- check
Vodka & Jameson- Check
Let’s make some freaking Cake Pops!!
Stupid freaking melting chocolate!!
It’s too thick & every time I try to dip the
stupid freaking cake pop, it crumbles
in the stupid freaking melting chocolate!!
Solution: Add shortening or oil-
I googled it, apparently thick chocolate is a “thing.”
Day 2, Hour 2
Where’d everybody go?
So it might not look exactly like the YouTube video but it’s close enough, right?
NOW they want to help… Day 2, hour 4
Luckily, all the tears, frustration, bad words and alcohol paid off.
Behold the “Dumb Ways to Die” Cake Pops…
Aren’t they amazing!? Don’t they look just like the originals?
It was so worth all my effort.
I can’t wait to start our next craft!
Just kidding….. THIS is what 1 YouTube video, 2 trips to the craft store on Black Friday, 1 ruined 11×17 pan of homemade mac & cheese, 24+ hours of your life that you will never ever get back and heaping amounts of GUILT will get ya…
17 horrific looking monster cake pops that you will be too embarrassed to serve anyone other than your children.
Minus the guilt, of course.
Some days guilt motivates you to do good things.
Today was not one of those days.
That’s just my normal.
(This post first ran on The Pursuit of Normal.)
About the author: Vicky Willenberg is a wife, mother and obsessive volunteer at her sons’ school. She works as a Social Media and Communications Manager while juggling the class bake sale and folding laundry from two weeks ago. You can find her chronicling her adventures in raising two boys while still growing up herself on her blog The Pursuit of Normal or sharing her daily shenanigans on Facebook. Vicky has been featured on Scary Mommy, BlogHer and Mamalode, as well as several other sites and has had the privilege of being a contributor to Scary Mommy’s Guide to Surviving the Holidays and both HerStories Project anthologies.
