Tuesday
Nov092010
Parent Appreciation Day
November 9, 2010 Think you have a shot at "most embarrassing parents?"
Not anymore.
The fact that "period" is spelled wrong pales in comparison with, you know, everything else.
Still, it could've been worse. Lucy's parents could have put her picture on the cake:
And then served it with a side of drippy cherry cheesecake.
Really.
Then again, is that really any worse than a commemorative toilet training cake?
Guys, there is such a thing as a generic celebration cake, you know. Just sayin'.
Oh, and Mom? Dad? I love you.
Thanks for the perspective, Anony M., Victoria C., & Britany S. And also for the vocabulary lesson.
Reader Comments (151)
I never heard of Menarche before. I looked it up and there are sites to get a party set for it. Not kidding. One of them had the game "Pin the tail on the ovaries." I honestly wish I were kidding about this.
http://www.menarchepartiesrus.com/
I understand celebrating menarche is normal in other cultures, but I'm German-American (several generations removed from Germany, but from a fairly isolated community), and we like to keep emotions bottled up and menarche a secret. I was MORTIFIED to the point of wanting to vomit when my mom told my grandma that I started. A cake on a buffet would surely have ended my life.
And anon, I'm currently eating an"oh thank God I got my period" bowl of ice cream.
Somebody needs some sensitivity training! :)
In case my loved ones are reading this....I'd like my menopause cake to be chocolate with chocolate icing with a nifty plastic battle axe on top! Thx! The inscription can read "Thanks for not killing us!"
I'm dreaming up all sorts of dazzling possiblities for the boy's developmental milestones....
Karin, it is "menarche" which is the onset of menses. In non-medical terms, the girl got her period and mom got her a cake.
Well its only because in our society FOR WOMEN sex and anything related to it is dirty that we don't celebrate a girl's transition to womanhood with her first period. It should be a joyous occasion, not one fraught with secrecy and shame.
I cannot imagine the amount of money that these girls/kids will be spending on therapy.
Just when I think you won't surprise me, you find something like this.
WV: ferster--The image of these cakes will ferster in my brain for years.
What a subject for an EPCOT. OY!!!
'Lucy' might be a junior high school teacher. Her morning class received really high marks -- but not in spelling. Think I'll go with that explanation, peroid.
The last one redefines 'inappropriate'. Actually, they all do, but this one sets a new American Standard.
I wonder what kind of cake that kid will receive to celebrate the completion of therapy.
It's fun to speculate what direction the celebration of future parental milestones might take at the hands of these kids ("Happy Anniversary, Mom and Dad!"). But maybe these kids won't be into revenge. Yeah, right.
wv: stosse. Jus' tosse these.
I gave each of my daughters a nice (IF. 1 ctw, good cut, strong color change) color change garnet when they made the "change" into womanhood. I wanted them to know they were rare and beautiful gems. When they hit menopause I'll give them color change sapphires so they know know they are not only beautiful but strong too.
Aw, man! It was bad enough when my mom made me make a sign that read "World's Newest Woman" and show it to family over the webcam! Thank goodness she didn't throw me a party with one of these cakes!
Yaay to Sarah, who got the meaning behind the cakes. Maybe the poopy cake could should be flushed, but the others are celebrating something that many cultures regard as special. Without a period, folks, you just don't get those cute babies, and no opportunity for weird shower cakes. Celebrating life passages is definitely cultural, and we might benefit from thinking outside of the typical American box. Don't orthodox Jews celebrate puberty? Some Native American cultures used to (not sure if they still do) and cake might just be appropriate for a celebration. Okay, I'll step off my soap box now.
Today's cakes made me think of this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpypeLL1dAs
Love the blog :)
Seriously. The dripping cherry cheesecake is a bit much!
hahahahahah wtf?
died laughing at the "drippy cherry cheesecake"
When I got my first, I cried for an entire week and hid from the world. My classmates thought I was dying to be gone all week. That was a good mom to let me do that.
Although cake might have made me feel better...
ha ha ha ha ha.... I love this site!! I can't IMAGINE the hours of therapy it'll take these kids to recover from these cakes!!!
This blog post totally goes along with a couple of these cakes... http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2009/11/allie-starts-her-moon-time.html
(I recently found Allie, myself and have for days now, been reading her blog from the beginning up to the present. Truly funny stuff!)
I get celebrating a girl's passage to womanhood. But honoring a milestone is a bit different from splashing it across a cake for all to see.
Just like keeping something more-or-less private is different from being ashamed or disgusted by it.
Oh, sad! And so mean! I think I would cry if I had a period cake. A "Peroid" cake would have the same affect
Re: NiteNurse at 9:59am:
A midwinter Hot Flashes party! Brilliant! For the first time in 8 years, I'm sorry to be done with menopause. Wish I'd thought of it back then.
I rather wanted a discreet little celebration - a few women friends for luncheon - to celebrate my daughters' joining the ranks of womanhood, but neither of them would hear of it. Sigh.
Anonymous @ 12:21 PM
Orthodox Jews may celebrate puberty, but Orthodox men won't touch women they don't know because they may be menstruating and are therefor considered "unclean." Orthodox women need to go to a ritual bath after their periods so they are no longer "dirty."
Not much to celebrate there, if you ask me.
Surely, there's nothing shameful about one's monthly cycle. But a party? with cake? and pin the "tampon on the correct anatomical part?
Seems like a bit much.
Oh btw, I think rubies are a fabulous idea. And I'm till waiting for my menopause cake!
What kind of gift do you bring to a period party? I'll have to check Hallmark the next time I'm there to see if they have a section of greeting cards for this.
My parents did something like that, they gave me a card and a figurine of a girl with my age on it to commemorate my first period. At the time I didn't think it was odd, but after I told my husband he was totally weirded out.
oh my gosh, i have a picture of me at what appears to be that age on the toilet, and i appear to be making the same face. what is WITH parents?
Menu for a proper Menarche Party:
Eggs (hard boiled), fresh buns from the oven, red Kool-Aid, one of those lovely Menarche Cakes, and of course plenty of chocolate. And for a new twist on setting the table, instead of regular napkins...
Remember moms, good parenting isn't just about being all nice and comforting. It's also about making sure your daughter is motivated to move out on her own. This hoo ha should definitely sow the seeds of longing for sweet escape.
I'm thinking a guy needs to have his first, um, err, I can't find a good way to say this... explosion cake. Yeah, that's it. Or eruption?
Is it bad that I made a red velvet cake lovingly decorated with a (ahem) party favor made out of frosting on top to celebrate the onset of my sister-in-law's monthly milestone? Hmmmm......
Oh, I don't know which is more hysterical, the cakes, or the multitude of comments here about them. Thanks for the great laughs all!
By the way, which of you gets to moderate the comments today? John, did you draw the short straw on this one? :-)
So what if other cultures celebrate it? We live in THIS ONE, and it's an embarrassing topic. Cultural context IS important.
Oh man! I wish you had posted this last week, when it was MY daughter's turn!
Oh, don't tell her I said so...
lol
When I turned 50, I mentioned it in Sunday Service. During coffee hour, the new minister came up and crowed "Oh! We MUST have a Croning for you!"...
Personally, I am proud of my age and don't happen to think that 50 is the crest of a very steep hill and that all that lies before me is a vast thorny wasteland. I don't need to "celebrate" the fact that I have "become a crone"... YEESH!
I have no problem with celebrating if the girl is fine with it but I think maybe in a bit more a of subtle way. Red dripping cheesecake is horror inducing.
"So what I'm wondering is this; in this age of equal-opportunity, if we are celebrating a girl's step into womanhood with cake, what are we doing for the boys? "Happy Spontaneous Erection" eclairs?"
OK, way to make me snort milk out my nose!! I'll be laughing about that line all day!! :P
wv: naltiple - there were naltiple reasons not to order a cake.
THE CHERRY CHEESECAKE, Jesus Christ.
@ Anonymous 9:39 a.m. LOL
@ 9:57, yes, you are right, but those times I was old enough to have something more alcoholic...
"I'll dissent here. In many non-Western cultures menarche is seen as an important rite of passage, which makes a lot of sense socially and biologically."
BUT CAKE?
Couldn't we have a ritual passing of jewelry, anointing with oils in a nice hot bath, and a new wardrobe?
Would that not be massively better than writing the word "menarche" on a cake?
My MIL once told me that 'WOmen should be honoured to get their periods as it means they are now capable of having babies!'
My uterus tries to KILL me once a month and I am happily never ever ever having kids so if I want to be less than cheery about the whole period thing I will be.
I remember the cake my parents gave me for my first wet dream party. I will spare you the graphical jokes that I could have made. You're all welcome.
can you imagine you are a decorator in a backery/grocery and you are reading your orders for the day and you find this?????
Aww man, I didn't know people got cakes to celebrate these 'milestones'! Now I'm upset that I didn't get a hysterectomy cake...imagine what could have been done with that one!
So what if other cultures celebrate it? We live in THIS ONE, and it's an embarrassing topic. Cultural context IS important.
I think the point was that the cakes may have been created for/served for people from other cultures who celebrate this milestone/rite of passage.
I am from THIS culture (American) and was happy to have a small celebration with friends at the time (outing for junk food/movie/manicures - although no cake that I can recall LOL). I was the last of my friends to get it and remember my mom making me feel pretty special that day.
Are you there, God? It's me, Lovonna.
Ahhmmm... They have my Mom beat. She had to announce to [everyone] in the family "Guess who became a young lady today" My sisters and I thought we would die.
When my sister's daughter started the first thing that came out of her mouth with a horrified look was "Don't tell G'Ma!!!" HA ha
And she might have served cake if she had thought about it. lol
JMO some things should be more private if that is what the "Young lady" wants.
Okay, I lost it at the drippy cherry cheesecake! Seriously?! Wow. I love cheesecake, but some things should not be celebrated so ... vividly.
And for a boy's special time...
Nocturnal emission cream pie
Couldn't we have a ritual passing of jewelry, anointing with oils in a nice hot bath, and a new wardrobe?
Would that not be massively better than writing the word "menarche" on a cake?
.....
So what if other cultures celebrate it? We live in THIS ONE, and it's an embarrassing topic. Cultural context IS important.
I say it's only embarrassing because women are taught to be embarrassed by their bodies. And I think it's great that some families out there don't do that. And why not write it on a cake? We celebrate all sorts of rites of passages with cake... why not this one? if it's because you're personally grossed out by it... think about why you feel that way.
My parents never got me a cake, but they did RUIN my trip to Disneyland by forcing my late-blooming, easily-humiliated pre-teen self to attend a "This is how babies are made" movie at Epcot with 100 strangers. I cried for 6 hours and didn't speak to them for a week. And remained too humiliated through my high school years to even kiss a boy. Abstinence education? Try extreme mortification education. It's far more effective.
BARF!!!!
oh my gosh... as if saying "happy period" wasn't bad enough... happy MENARCHE!?!? really? Who SAYS that anymore? and with a bloody drippy cheese cake? Man, I hope that girl turns 18 soon and can move out of the house.
Yah, I gotta say, I am now officially glad that my parents and I NEVER EVER talked about period and the fact that I got mine at 11 was a big secret. In fact, I'm nearly menopausal now and my mom STILL doesn't know I ever got it.
Thank you mom & dad. And I mean that.
I must have missed the memo about celebrating the one thing that I run away from screaming each month. Yeah, give me solitary confinement and chocolate.
Most horrifying post ever!
WV: Shears- I wish I could take the shears to my brain to destroy the memory of these horrific cakes. Poor, poor girls. And "Menarche Parties R'Us." ?!?!?! How can you live with yourselves?!
I have given the link to this page to my brother and sister-in-law, and I am making them promise that they will NOT do this to my niece.