Tomorrow is Cora’s birthday. She’ll be one year old, which is a pretty momentous event. We had great plans for celebration: Saturday was supposed to be the big family party, with aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, and great-grandparents in attendance. But it was supposed to snow Friday night into Saturday, and we were concerned that folks wouldn’t feel safe driving, so we moved the party to Monday. Unfortunately, we misjudged, and the title of this newspaper article tells the tale: Snowstorm Pummels Washington Area. So, instead of hoopla from Friday delayed to Monday, everyone is snowed in in their own little houses, and Cora’s birthday will be spent playing with just Mom and Dad.

Now the question is how much of a hoopla do we throw for our one year old? We’ve had the balloons up since Thursday, and Cora and our cat Joe have happily been pulling on the strings. But do we decorate with streamers? Do we put out the other decorations? And, the one I’m personally grappling with, do I decorate the 3-d duck cake that’ll take me probably 2+ hours to decorate? We have cupcakes – Cora actually had one this evening. Wouldn’t it be more appropriate to just decorate the cupcakes then go through the headache of decorating this large fowl? (The cake’s already baked, but baking the cake is the smallest part of the effort.)

The rational side of me says that Cora won’t know the difference, and that 2+ hours is a whole lot of time to spend on something. But if I was willing to do that when there were people coming over, what does that say about my motivations? Admittedly, Cora has never really seen a cake before, so the fact that this one is shaped like a duck won’t have much impact on her. When she’s older, that Mom makes cool cakes for her birthday might seem neat. Now, though, is it worth it to Mom to spend that much time? And the sad answer is, no. Apparently, I was willing to make the cake when I’d get the glory from the other folks attending, but I’m not willing to do it when it’s just my daughter and my husband, particularly when there are perfectly acceptable, newly-minted toddler-sized cupcakes on hand.