Ok, don't tell him about this post.

My brother-in-law is autistic. He's never been diagnosed, and I don't know how I should approach him about this. He's thirty years old, and he had always lived with his parents before he moved in with us.

I think it's important that he know, so he can research it and see that he's not alone. That it's ok for him to be different, and that there is a REASON he is different. Right now, I don't think he has a clue, and it's very sad.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

The Cake from Hell

It happened. Perrin turned 9 on Friday. We celebrated his birthday and Darcy's birthday (her 7th birthday is the 17th) today at my brother's house.

Tai made their cake last night, and it turned out beautifully. We bought the things to decorate it, but decided to do the decorating at Jeff's instead of doing them at home last night. Great. No problem.

Except, see, I put the lid on the cake too early last night, and the top ended up too moist to frost it. Ok fine. After I let it dry for a while, I tried it anyway. Dumb move. Scraped off some of the top of the cake, then scraped off the frosting. Jeff suggested I put it under the broiler for a minute to just crisp up the top. Good plan.

Except that the dogs ran away, and I poked my head out the door to see what was going on. By the time I came back in, maybe a minute and a half later, I'd burned the shit out of the top of the cake.

Next plan? Cut the burned top off, flip the cake out of the pan onto the lid, and frost the bottom. No problem. Except about 1/3 of the frosting was in the sink because I'd scraped it off the cake.

Sooooo...I had enough, barely, to cover the top of the cake, but since it was out of the pan now, I needed to cover the sides. I used the spray can of decorator frosting (orange) to swirl around the sides.

Ok, cake saved, right? Not quite. The gel that I bought to write "Happy Birthdays!" and "Perrin" and "Darcy" on the cake? It started to get runny and gross right about the time I made the exclamation point. Perrin and Darcy's names kind of oozed all over the sides of the cake. FINE. I stuck a finger in the frosting, mixed the gel into the white frosting on the sides of the cake, and made their names into an orange background to put the candles on. Sheeesh.

So we take the cake outside, because it's a pool party. And we can't get the candles lit. Too breezy. The flies loved the cake. The bees loved the cake. Me? I was just a weeee bit too frustrated with the cake to enjoy it. But it didn't look nearly as bad as it should have, and it tasted fine.

It just goes to show you...now matter how much you screw something up, there's always a chance it will turn out ok. Kinda like kids. :)