Barbie Cake Fantastic

This Barbie cake was made by the mother of a childhood friend of mine, E*. Every birthday this girl E* had, her mother made an even more fabulous Barbie cake than the year before, and every birthday she sent the party guests home with a photo of her creation. I guess she wanted our mothers to know how inferior they were and she wanted all us little girls to be jealous ad infinitum. She was a mean mother and often ordered us around throughout the entire birthday party. We were shuttled from one party event to the next like little sheep, with loud orders and announcements like "Now girls, you will watch E* play pin the tail on the donkey" or "Girls! Line up neatly and watch E* open her presents". Birthday parties were heavy business back then (and probably still are). They were certainly treated very seriously. I rarely see little pickled weiner hotdogs but when I do, I always remember E* and her mother. They were another rare but valuable commodity in the dream-like realm of birthday party memories. Those and little tiny pickles. Ah... mothers who knew how to throw the cogs in the memory-making machine of childhood. At these parties E* would also commonly order us around. I guess she felt the thrill of the power too. I remember us all being ushered into her room to listen to the new Michael Jackson record on her little pink hi-fi. A room full of girls in party dresses squished on her fluffy bed. I must have been genuinely jealous because my diary entries were consistently filled with lies about what grandoise events would occur at my next birthday party. Guest appearances of the likes of Olivia Newton John or an entire underwater themed celebration. Those diaries were also filled with lies about puppies and kittens. For example: " Another wonderful day! I received 5 kittens and 8 puppies as a surprise gift today!". Pretty much every day had an entry that went somewhere along those lines...

I wrote a story about E* and her crazy family. You can read it here.