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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To feel annoyed? ... oh I know i bloody am, just ranting

32 replies

snowleopard · 24/05/2007 20:33

Twas DP's birthday a few weeks ago and DS and I made him a cake - it fell apart a bit and was decorated by DS (pink icing, sweets everywhere, wonky candles etc) but it was actually a very nice cake as well as being heartwarming and lovely etc.

Well cue birthday evening and DP is having his mates round (we had had other bday celebrations earlier and lunch out) - one of them brings his girlfriend and she has made this uber-posh cake which totally outshone my cake. Now I'm not a housewifey cake-proud type at all but it was embarrassing, we were the only two women there and it felt like some kind of village cake contest etc, DP went on and on about how fab her cake was, I seethed and felt upset on behalf of DS (though he was in bed! )

Well tonight he is going out with his mates to a gig, I was invited but felt like a night in. The same woman comes round this evening to get a lift with my DP (her boyfriend is in the band) and they sit in the kitchen and DP starts up again about her FRIGGING CAKE and how it was so amazing and the best cake he's ever tasted, blah blah blah de blah. Lying bastard! Meanwhile I am taking out the bins, doing various chores etc and our friend only turns to me to ask me some polite questions about DS. These friends are a lot younger than us, oh also did I mention this woman is stunningly beautiful and stylish, and I just felt a thousand years old, boring, frumpy, furious with DP, FURIOUS with myself for getting competitive over a CAKE and just basically a complete and utter saddo.

I don't think there's anything going on or anything, I don't not trust DP, but I do think he probably fancies her a bit and was sucking up to her.

Sorry this is so long and blimmin pointless and trivial, just needed a rant, if anyone wants to join me in a glass of red wine I'm off to get it.

OP posts:
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Original poster
snowleopard · 24/05/2007 22:05

fillyjonk I KNOW! How can DS's pink collapsed cake not be the most beautiful cake in the world to DP???

However I'm not sure DP did actually prefer her cake or was just being super-smarmy.

FFF2, I do think she is sweet and innocent and meant well - she may even have been being extra-thoughtful and thought I wouldn't have time or something (but if that's the case she could have checked). I am more annoyed with DP than her though.

OP posts:
NikkiBFG · 24/05/2007 22:00

I'd go mad! I'm very territorial with DH's stomach and even get jealous when he raves over cakes women in work have made!

I'd make her feel awful and say oh DS cried because your cake was prettier and he wanted Daddy to like his more...but then I have no shame!

Genidef · 24/05/2007 22:00

same here firefly x-post!

Genidef · 24/05/2007 21:59

Lovely idea baking a cake for the wife
Very weird to turn up with one for someone else's husband (unless asked of course - could someone have suggested it to her?!)

fireflyfairy2 · 24/05/2007 21:59

Oops the thread has moved on

I still think she wouldn't have did it purposefully to offend you

fireflyfairy2 · 24/05/2007 21:58

Um.. my SIL is a fantastic baker. And would think nothing of knocking a cake up in a few hours. She would have went the whole hog if she knew before hand they were going to someones birthday!

I was in her house a few weeks ago and she had this beautiful cake sitting on the worktop. It was the shape of a pink handbag with a flower draped over it. I asked if someone had ordered it. She said no, she was going visiting to a friend of her dh's & she knew it was his wifes birthday, she she baked it for her!!

Maybe the lady is just a bit like my SIL? She is lovely, skinny & blonde, can chat to anyone, but would never in a million years dream that she had offended you!!

I think that my SIL just gets pleasure out if baking. They have no kids yet & she says it helps her pass the time.

Do you think maybe she thought she was being nice & hadn't even thought that she would offend you??

[I'd actually be pissed off at Dh for keeping on commenting on it ]

elasticbandstand · 24/05/2007 21:58

she is just so tryign too hard... yuch

JodieG1 · 24/05/2007 21:56

Also baking a cake for someone else's husband is a bit

fillyjonk · 24/05/2007 21:56

but this is

what about your ds

he MADE A CAKE (oh okay he didn't but...)

big grr vibes to mr leopard

JodieG1 · 24/05/2007 21:55

That would have annoyed me too. I'm really sensitive over my cooking and baking (I'm fairly good at it too) and I'd hate it if dh said some other woman's cake was better than mine.

lulumamasmentee · 24/05/2007 21:52

Snowleopard your being way to harsh on herself, nice little sweet girl has been played to death for flips sake. If she's old enough to bake a perfect huge gorg cake shes old enough to know that its not on to bake it for somebody elses husband.

Thats just weird.

Original poster
snowleopard · 24/05/2007 21:49

She's soooooo nice eb, and I most emphatically am not. I mean I am a nice person but I can be socially awkward, say the wrong things, and obviously I'm harbouring nasty resentful thoughts about her which she doesn't deserve. She makes me feel like the wicked witch of the west. I'm not good with people like that, I like my friends a bit bitchy! (sorry that sounds bad but you know what I mean - it's hard to let off steam about life's stresses with someone who is all sweetness and light)

OP posts:
elasticbandstand · 24/05/2007 21:43

i bet it tasted yuck yuck

is she very young?
naive perhaps,
or naice

Blondilocks · 24/05/2007 21:41

I think a cake is more appropriate than a random present, but I suppose wine would have been a safer option.

Nightynight · 24/05/2007 21:36

I think Sandy's right. Baking a cake for another woman's husband is a bit odd.
And bloody tactless of him to go on about it.

Blondilocks · 24/05/2007 21:32

I wouldn't worry too much - my DD ended up with 3 birthday cakes last yr & one cost... wait for it... £40!!!!!

SSSandy2 · 24/05/2007 21:29

oh come on now, this is not the time for being charitable.

Every woman knows you don't bake a cake for someone else's husband and take it to his home on his birthday FGS. It would be ok maybe at work or at a club or something but taking a birthday cake to his home is just weird. I think I might let her know that the present you'd all appreciated best was a fantastic bottle of cognac on one of dh's past birthdays. You know, just in passing, as you do..

moondog · 24/05/2007 21:24

Ah Snow.
Poor you!
Sorry,I know it's a pain but you have written it up so beuatifully.
I would start making eyes at one of his mates and raving about muscly forearmsn DIY prowess or similar.

Original poster
snowleopard · 24/05/2007 21:21

PS. Her cake was so enormous, most of it had to be taken to DP's work where it was wolfed down in about 30 seconds in the staffroom.

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Original poster
snowleopard · 24/05/2007 21:20

Thanks lulummm too.

The thing is bakery politics had never entered my head before. I'm so not like that. So this is not only infuriating in itself, it's worrying because I'm thinking OMG, I had a baby, I have now become the kind of person who competes with other women's bakery.

OP posts:
Original poster
snowleopard · 24/05/2007 21:16

Thanks tribpot - those would be the words to use and I think both of them could use a bit more awareness, but I probably wouldn't raise it with her (though I probably will with him) simply because it would just make me look like EVEN MORE of a domesticated old frump to get all serious about it. (ooh we really need an emoticon!) She is just very young, she's incredibly sweet and nice and innocent, and I'm 100% sure she meant well so anything I said would just make me the villain.

The other thing is though, the cake that DS and I made may have looked a fright, but it tasted nicer! IT DID!

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lulumamasmentee · 24/05/2007 21:09

Oh god am seething for you. No she shouldn't of taken a cake to yours, she was probably just trying to be nice, but v misguided behaviour in female land. DP is being typical man by simpering to her. We have a female aquaintance who comes round and laughs like a drain at the slightest hint of DP even talking (even to the point of another of our male friends actually noticing and asking what on earth she was laughing at).

Very poor show on both their sides. Not sure what to suggest other than teasing dp about it and saying "god could you have sucked up to her anymore, she looked totally embarassed" he'll be so mortified that he wont do it anymore

tribpot · 24/05/2007 21:07

The politics of baking. They are complicated.

I would guess that, she thought "here I am, a fabulous cook and single gal, how can I relate to this social situation? I can bring food" Quite why she thought another cake was the way forward I don't know, but to give her the benefit of the doubt, she probably thought it'd be useful and not redundant / making your effort look bad. (Btw, I refuse to do baking of any kind except potatoes, but both dh and ds are wheat-intolerant so this gives me the perfect excuse).

I do think you should tell dp why it hurts you that has made so much of the cake (not because it means he's going to cheat on you but even so). You did something nice and then someone else with infinitely more time on her hands came in and did a much better job - well sod that, who is the mother of his child, after all?

I think she needs to understand bringing the cake is bad - can you start dropping hints like "god, that cake was so great, but we had so much left at the end because ds had made his daddy a cake too, I think he felt a bit sad because his wasn't as fancy as yours". And then try and suggest something else she could bring - starters or something?

Desiderata · 24/05/2007 20:53

Thanks, snowleopard. What are you having?

fuzzywuzzy · 24/05/2007 20:50

At her Dp's b'day take round a Jane Asher cake (unprompted) pass it off as yours, and see what happens