Dh asked me to hang up my apron for good :( - Page 3

ditto!

I work five days a week till 3, pick up my two (under four) from daycare, head home, cook dinner etc, shower the kids etc and get them off to bed and that is when my "hobby" caking begins. The most I have done so far is two cakes and 40 cupcakes for a weekend. Granted, it does drive my husband a tad nuts, and he is also a bit of a clean freak. However, maybe you should point out that if he thinks you are slow and it renders it not worthwhile, there is only one way your speed will increase and that is with getting more practice and confidence. Potentially it could be a great money spinning venture but you have to start somewhere. I feel that its important to have things that you enjoy for yourself and your whole life doesn't always have to revolve around the house and kids all the time either. But obviously its about trying to get the whole balancing act right for your family as a whole

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It looks this is a minority opinion here but I share it.

What if the OP was telling us this:
My Dh just loves to build stuff in his garage. He has tools everywhere. Every night after dinner he goes out there and uses his tools and holy cow the mess. I'm so sick of seeing it.

And then he spends the entire weekend building furniture for all our friends. For FREE!! I can't even tell you how much money he's spent and I'm spending all my time watching the kids and he can't ever seem to find the time to help me with them or the stuff around the house because he's too busy building while I sit and watch tv alone.

How many of us would be all over her about getting her DH to cut back on the woodworking and get his butt in the house and help and she shouldn't have to put up with his behavior?

To the OP:
I'm not saying you should give up caking, but really - is your marriage worth it? Is it worth it to miss out on the time with your small kids? Together the two of you need to come to some sort of compromise. He shouldn't make you give up your hobby, but it's not okay for it to interfere with your household either. JMO[/quote]

My thoughts exactly. Another thing to keep in mind as well is that your husband could've been saying things out of anger, you know the anger that can happen when you can't sleep well because your wife is not in bed for half the night, waking up with the kids and zombified wife to a trashed kitchen....can you imagine the furniture building senario but instead of the garage , he's building in the livingroom or bathroom? The kitchen is a shared family area in most homes and i can see why husband would have an outburst....I would take a cake vacation to let him cool down and when you start up again, be mindful of hubby's time and sttention needs.

Just to clarify... I used the word "allow", that was my take on it. It didn't come from the OP stating that her husband used that exact wordit just rubs me the wrong way when that is basically what he is saying.

That is an awful lot of time to work on a simple cake...

I have only really timed myself once (I set a personal challenge) and decorated a 7 tier Margaret Braun inspired cake in 8 hours start to finish. It was all cake dummies, but I coated each with buttercream and fondant and made all the embellishments, airbrushed, painted, made royal icing, etc.

Your hubby is right - I don't see how you can ever charge enough to make a profit on a 2 tier cake that takes 14 hours to make.

I would continue to make cakes if that's what you love - but perhaps start working on embellishments a little earlier and do it only a few hours each week. Lots of decorations can last for a long time (gumpaste, royal icing, modeling chocolate, etc.)

I don't think I'd have a lot of patience for my man having a hobby that took that much time away from me and the kids either.

So true! Why do I like to do this to myself?

I agree with the others who said to come to a compromise. Is there any way you could work on things during the day while your dh is at work. When we lived together, I learned to let my nephews, (now aged 9, 6, and 3) "help" me from their standpoint. If I was cutting things out of fondant, they had their own fondant to cut things out of. When making a free or family cake, I let them them help put in the ingredients for the cake, I measured, they poured it in. When it was time to take it out of the oven, one got to hand me the oven mitts. Little things like that that free up your nights so you have time to spend with your family.

When they helped me make my best friend's cheesecake, bf told me it was the best cheesecake he ever had. I just smiled and told him, I'm glad you liked it.

As far as getting faster, you have to challenge yourself to go faster. If it takes you 20 min to ice a cake, challenge yourself to do it in 15 min. Once you get comfortable with the 15, challenge yourself to do it in less time.

sounds like a catch-22 going on. cakesbycathy is right that we'd be all over this if it was the other way around but when reading the original post, my thoughts went the direction of unlimited's and others.

So if the wife wasn't doing cakes, what WOULD she be doing? Sitting on the couch watching TV with him? Spending all of HER time watching the kids so he could watch TV on the couch? (and by the way, it's not called "babysitting" when they are HIS kids,)

Understand my bias ..... I divorced a violent, control freak so I tend to see red flags where most don't.

Maybe it has to do with age/maturity/life experience. My hubby was a woodworker (ironic comparison, huh?) and he spent hours in the woodshop, every single night, when he had a project going. No big deal to me. It was what he enjoyed doing. He does stand up comedy on the side, which entails lots of late hours at the clubs, lots of hours in front of the computer writing bits. Most are unpaid (open mikes, competitions, etc). Do I complain about the time/money? No .... because it's what he enjoys and he's good at it.

At the same time, perhaps the OP can find some organizational tips (with small children at home, I know this is the big challenge!) that can streamline the work to reduce the time involved. Little things like keeping a wet dishcloth handy to wipe down the counters after every step to reduce cleaning time. I lay large parchment papers on my counter so when I'm done, I just wad up the paper and the counter is 99% clean. Wash dishes and pans, etc., as you go instead of stacking them up to wash at the end of the night when we're exhausted and tired.

I will share that my hubby began to REALLY take thsi serious when I wrote the check for the down payment on his never-been-off-the-showroom-floor pickup .... and when I paid $2000 for landscaping, out of my business profits. Oh yeah, THEN he took notice!!!

I hope you don't stop making cakes, it sounds like you enjoy it, so why give it up? I know, easier said then done..
I love my cakes, and yes , sometimes.. it's a love/hate relationship but that's MY TIME, and dh understands it 100%.. I don't say anything when he wants to another dewalt tool, and he doesn't say anything to me when I bought the cricut cake..
Hope it all works out for you,
Jodi

The thing is though, according to the OP's post she is taking upwards of 14 hours just to complete one cake and she is doing it for free. Even if she was selling them, unless she's getting like $25 a serving IMO her DH's feelings are justified. For the time away from her family and the mess and the lack of sleep...sorry that's not worth it when everyone (including the OP) is suffering.

And absolutely DH should help. But we would all be resentful, too if we were carrying all the load without help. It sounds like this is how her DH is feeling. Again, nobody is saying give up caking, but something has to change. Getting faster, not being such a perfectionist, charging, a maid, babysitter, something

INDYDEBI SAID....

"So if the wife wasn't doing cakes, what WOULD she be doing? Sitting on the couch watching TV with him? Spending all of HER time watching the kids so he could watch TV on the couch? (and by the way, it's not called "babysitting" when they are HIS kids,) "

AMEN, Debi! When my friends used to say "l'll see if DH will babysit", I'd say babysit??? It's called PARENTING!!!

How do you figure DH is "carrying all the load without help"? OP is there all day, every day with the kids without help and isn't complaining. Why is it when men have to take care of the kids it's babysitting but when women do it it's being a mother? A marriage is a partnership not a dictatorship. If he wants to spend time with her he could try keeping her company in the kitchen instead of expecting her to sit by his side on the couch. I'd like to know how many loads of laundry and how many floors he scrubs a week if he's such a neat freak. Since when is everything the wifes job? Men seem to think being a wife and mother is so much easier then working a real job................give me a break. Yeah this a hot spot with me.

My father was an abusive control freak. This is a sensitive subject and probably why so many of us took exception. That said, I'm so glad that I have a man NOT like my father. My husband fully supports what I do and even helps me when he can. Our kitchen is TINY, so that makes for some interesting challenges. But, he knows my goals and encourages them.

Yeah. I could make more money babysitting (been there) or even cleaning houses (done that). I was miserable. I'm not miserable when I'm decorating a cake.

And Tiggy? Being a wife and a mother IS a real job! We just don't get paid for it. Hmm...kinda like CAKE DECORATING (for those who do it as a hobby)!

I think everyone is taking this to a level that it is not - reading that post, I do not see how the husband is being a control freak, or not pulling his load. The OP says she has been working 6-7 weeks, several hours a day on these cakes. While leaving a mess one night should be forgiven, it seems to be his pet peeve, and after a few weeks feeling alone, this was like the last straw. If I were in the same situation, I would be mad too. All moms need a little time to themselves sometimes, but 10-14 hours a week of "after hours" time is considerable. Like I said before, maybe you can compromise to 2 cakes a month, paid. Afterall, everyone wants a free cake, but once you start charging, not everyone is going to want to fork over the money. You will have less demand, more money, and more time to spend with the hubby. BTW, he wasn't angry that she wasn't taking care of the kids, but taking care of the hubby is probably even more important, even if it is just snuggling on the couch watching TV sometimes!

I find it interesting that for me, it was easier to do cakes from home (no more than 2 per week) when my kids were smaller. I had a 2 and a 6 year old when at my peak. I did everything in steps. Make icing in one time slot, then do something with the kids, then crumb coat and put cakes in fridge, go back to kids, ice one cake, go back to kids. It made it an all day affair, but it made it sane for me to do it in steps like that.

Now my kids are 6 & 10 and I find it near impossible, even though they're in school. They go in the fridge themselves now (STRESS!) they want to help because they know how to do it (But not do it well enough to work on a paid cake!) , they want to tell me a story about what happened in school (that can take quite a while!) or they want a piece of the cake!!!! So I find it's harder now that they're older. And in the evenings, when my dh is home, I don't want to spend more than an hour or two on a cake.

Another different thing, I've been doing cakes for 10 years, and if I'm enjoying myself and not just getting it done, it takes LONGER to do a cake than it did. When before I might spend 5 mins mixing up colored icing, I could waste a stupid HOUR on it now! I want that color perfect! Not peach, but a salmon color, etc. Also, if I see a piped border has a little error in it, I'll take that section off and redo it. When before it would have been good enough for me.

Anyway, what worked for me and might work for you is to work in steps. Make a list (bake cakes, freeze cakes, make icing, make board, get boxes ready, make up bags, etc) and just do one at a time. I find I'm more creative at night, so I'd do the dirty work like baking, making icing, crumb coating, etc, during the day, then spend the evening with dh, then spend 2-3 hours on Friday night, after he went to bed, icing and putting it together. Sometimes I'd wake up early on Saturday to finish it up.

-I only took orders for Friday night pickups. Even if their party was Sunday, they had to pick it up Friday and store it themselves. It gets it all out of your house before the weekend. And I think if you started to charge something (I'd suggest no less than $40) for your cakes, dh would be less annoyed. Cakes cost money! Especially in the beginning when you keep needing new things.