If you want something done right...

(Alternate title: Bunnycakes: the stuff of nightmares) (now with a nice lemon buttercream)

The Domestic Goddess doesn't suffer fools /is a rock, she is an i-i-i-island sometimes knows her limitations.

Please note:  although I refer to myself as a domestic goddess, it is firmly tongue-in-cheek, and I am not really a perfectionist.  But things usually turn out pretty well, especially decorated baked goods (even when I'm hiding zucchini in things) (shhhh).

The other morning, I was rushing around, getting ready for an Easter potluck lunch, because Fis had signed me up for both a savoury and a sweet contribution.

Thanks, Fis.

It was Saturday morning. 

I got out of bed first, and fed the Hufflings with fresh-from-the-oven hot cross buns.  (They were store-bought then popped into the oven - I'm not insane.)  I then got to work making a dillicious (...because it has dill in it...) orzo salad and bunnycakes.

Bunnycakes, if you don't know, are bunny-shaped cupcakes and are absolutely adorable.  They're quick, easy to make (with a cake mix), easy to decorate, and you can keep the so-precious Easter theme going with using the rest of the batter to make bunny-bum cupcakes.  Brilliant.

So cute, right?  Perfect just the way they are, right?

I had a box of rainbow-bit cake mix in the cupboard, so I greased the bunny tin, put paper liners in the cupcake tin, and mixed it up.  I poured in the batter, they all (bunnies and bums alike) went into the oven, baked up nicely, and I even remembered to turn them out after 10 minutes, which I honestly almost never remember to do, resulting in bunnies-stuck-to-the-pan, deformed bunnycakes, and SNBs.  But I did it!  They looked great!

I let them cool while I made a quick lemon buttercream (butter, icing sugar, milk, lemon zest and some lemon juice), then iced the cupcakes first.  I left the centre of each bare, dipped each in a plate of desiccated coconut (fur!), then had my wee Helper Huffling dip mini marshmallows in the frosting and stick it in the middle.

Wait for it...

I present:  bunny bums!  

(Note:  this is a multi-holiday baked good.  For example, you could serve these at a midwinter feast and call them yeti nipples, too.)

But, I digress.

I was still running around like a madwoman, chopping salad fixings, blanching peas, grating parmesan (it's a great salad), and still had the six bunnycakes to frost.  As I started them, Chris came in from a run.

Yes, he signed me up for a potluck, slept in, then went for a run, leaving me with all the food prep and three children.  He did that.  To me.

He possibly felt a bit bad (because I told him that he should).  He watched me dip the last two bunnycakes in the coconut.

"What can I do?" he asked.  My first suggestion -- that he invent a time machine and not do any of those things that he had done -- was not well taken, but I said, "You can figure out candies for the bunnies' faces."

Let's be clear about this.  I accepted his sweet, sincere offer of help, knowing that I was overwhelmed and that the "hard part" was done, and that we had to leave in less than 30 minutes.  I ran off to get in the shower.

I came out of the shower, dressed and got ready to go.  I took the salad out of the fridge, then went to pick up the cake carrier.  The things inside of it stared at me.

...

You know when someone tries to do something nice for you and you just can't tell them that they failed hard and that they're an idiot for what they did because they were honestly trying to be nice even if they ruined everything?  I tried not to say anything.  I was actually speechless.  Chris was standing there with half of a yay-I-helped and half of an uh-oh-something's-wrong-but-I-don't-know-what-it-is look on his face.

I walked over to the bunnycake pan and picked it up to show him.  Remember?  It looked like this.  (There are, in my (ok, perfectionist, if you must) mind, two distinct areas:  the ears area and the face area.  That eyes would be placed onto.  Am I alone in feeling that some truths are self-evident?)

He immediately looked even more uncomfortable.  I could sense that his mind was clicking into the area of, "Yes, that is something that I should have done" or getting closer to, "What I did was not that" and even a little bit of, "Oh dear."

This is what he made:

Dear Lord

Now, he did offer to help.  And he was super creative in cutting those gummi hearts to make both the teeth and the nose, and each ...uh...thing... had different-coloured skittles eyes.  It was not the end of the world and he was trying to help.  And I really need to let these things go.  (I repeated these to myself several times.)  But those are not bunnycakes.

However, not all was lost.  The DG has learned a valuable lesson.  Not to get up earlier, manage her time better or supervise all helpers closely even if they're 45.  No, she learned that the bunnycake pan can also be used to make FiscakesTM, which would fit right in on a buffet table with yeti nipples next winter.  Am I right?