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PastaQueen

You'll laugh you ass off. (I did.)

A history of cake

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I have a lot of photos of myself sitting in front of cake. I noticed this when I dug out my mother’s photos albums and boxes of unsorted prints looking for a good “before” photo earlier this year. “No wonder I was so fat. I was always eating cake!” I thought. Then I realized that, no, I wasn’t always eating cake. We just always took pictures of me on my birthday, at which we always ate cake.

These pictures do provide a good timeline of how I’ve aged over the years, and what my taste in pastries was at the time. So today, I give you a history of cake.

Cake

Age: 10

Wearing a corduroy jumper made by mother. I was currently obsessed with headbands. Looks like we got out the fancy metal plates for the occasion! I love how my hands are encircling the cake, as if to say, “Mine, all mine!”

Cake

Age: 14

Wearing my marching band T-shirt and about to devour a Tazmanian Devil cake.

Cake

Age: 15

Wearing one of those long t-shirts we used to tie in a knot on the side, or if you were feeling fancy you’d use a plastic t-shirt tie. No, it wasn’t in fashion at the time :) Thank goodness it’s dark so you can’t see quite how frizzy my hair is.

Cake

Age: 16

Wearing one of the four plaid shirts I lived in at the time, even though grunge was on its way out. If I pre-dated these photos I could pretend I was trendy.

Cake

Age: 23

Wearing a Lane Bryant top, which was quite comfy but depressingly a size 24/26.

Cake

Age: 24

Down one gallbladder, but still able to digest high-fat ice cream cake. Weight, 372 pounds.

Cake

Age: 25

Finally decreasing in size, down to 260 pounds. Cake is noticeably smaller.

Cake

Age: 26

200 pounds! No longer obese. Let’s celebrate with cake!

Cake

Age: 27

At my lowest weight, 175 pounds. Am I smiling because of my size or because of the Oreo Blizzard cake? (Definitely because of the cake.)

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Comments

  1. Great photo history! I’d vote for that first cake which you so wisely protected with your encircling arms. I like that you still celebrate with cake, but have obviously learned how to do it and still maintain your new lifestyle.

  4. Great, great post! I’m sure I could create a similar post, but instead it would be entitled The History of Christmas Dessert.

  5. I love your journey through cake!

    I came across a photo of me on my 12th or 13th party (it was hard to count the candles) of me greedily sitting in front of my own cake. Except I never had ‘cake’ for my birthday. It was always cheesecake.

  7. That was fun. I think you have a mom that loves you very much.

    I have a question. How did you get those older pictures onto the computer?

  12. Someone did not mention that today is her birthday. We did celebrate with cupcakes this past weekend. Sorry I did not think to take a picture. We will just have to go back and reenact the cafe hopping. Happy Birthday!!!!! I love you dearly, Mom

  13. Gimme some cake! Love the history in those photos! Having just turned 32 I ended up having two cakes. One on my birthday, where the twin sis got us a tiny 6 inch round carrot cake. Then, a couple days later with my mother, who always wants to make sure that we have cake for our birthday after she skipped a year when I was losing. By accident instead of getting the 8 in round she ended up with a 12 inch round. Half of it sat in my fridge until I could unload it on the place I volunteer. Where it mostly went…. but I will admit to finishing it off, well the frosting anyways, that’s always the best part imho. It’s only once a year that I allow my self that sugary lard goodness. Sigh. Time to start counting down again.

  14. OMG, the comment about the plastic t-shirt tie thingie, hilarious!

    Thanks for the laugh.

    I love birthday cake. I love it. Definitely worth the butt busting workout it takes before and after!

  15. HAPPY BIRTHDAY JENNETTE! Go out and celebrate because you look fabulous (but you were always adorable to us).

  16. Happy Happy Birthday Jennette! Loved this posting, seeing the changes over the years is very cool. Hope you enjoyed your day!

  22. Ohhh, 80s glasses. I had some of those. :-) I have this absolutely traumatic picture of myself in the first grade, circa 1984 with those big ol’ glasses and… wait for it… a mullet. Yep. My mom insists to this day that it was a shag. Lie-telling.

    Anyway, happy birthday! You look amazing!

  25. I just wanted to tell you something. When I started looking through those photos I got tears in my eyes. Maybe because I am so used to seeing pictures of you now (skinny) and even though I had seen the before pics on your site, seeing the progression in years and the weight on you, it made it so much more real. Because that could be my life too, and so many other people’s, sitting in front of the cake weighing 278 pounds (+) year after year, but then you shrank. What a reminder of what you have done for yourself. It really gives me hope that I, too, can complete this weight loss journey and not have to have the giant face (and body) anymore.

    Thanks, and Happy Birthday.

  28. You are freaking hilarious. It’s weird but in the photo with the Lane Bryant top on, you look like you but someone just filled you up with air.

  29. Isn’t it nice to know you’re one of those people who gets better looking with age? I feel sorry for people who reach their peak of beauty at 18 or something.

  33. Happy Bday, you are so brave and confident. All my “before” pics are in a bin, hidden deep in the closet. And while my boyfriend knows that I used to be HUGE, he’s only seen like one pic. I hate all those old pics of me! Even my daughter, who has been with me through it all, can’t believe I used to be so big. Ugh.

    You look very lovely.

    And thanks to the fashion Gods that gigantic glasses are not the rage anymore(or was it just my poor fashion sense?), I have some fantastic photos of my face drowning in enormous, pink frames.

  36. so its my birthday tomorrow….

    we should have celebrated together.

    a couple of days ago i went to a ‘raw food’ class. i tasted the yummiest cheesecake EVER!! all raw!! all natural. nothing nothing even remotely unhealthy. soo….i will be making it today to be all chilled for consumption tomorrow. cant wait!!

    i loved your photos by the way…keep them coming!!

  37. Happy birthday! This was a cool post. Interesting way to chronicle one’s life…in birthday cake. I just absolutely *had* to have a cupcake from Adrienne & Co today so I guess I was subconsciously celebrating your birthday. ;)

  40. This was fun to read. I wish I had thought to take a similar picture of my son every year. I like the Fall leaves tablecloth in a couple of the pictures! I hope you have a fantastic birthday!

  42. Happy Birthday!

    I had one of my favorite cakes yesterday – Great Wall of Chocolate at P.F. Chang’s. The server didn’t bring out individual plates so we all just dug in. The people to cake ratio was perfect. I didn’t feel like I had to rush to make sure I got enough. Also it’s nice not to go by portion size on occasion and just eat as much as you want – especially with cake!

  43. We have the same birthday!

    Happy Birthday!! I have three cakes in my fridge right now. One form my coworkers, one form my mom and one from my friends. They’re driving me bananas!!! Think the food bank will take 3 half eaten cakes? :(

  44. My mother once took a pic of me at a birthday party with one of those lovely hyper color t-shirts. The ones that changed colors when you touched them. Tragic fashion…

  45. To quote the great Homer (Simpson, that is)… “Mmmmmmmmm. Cake.”

    Happy mildly belated Birthday, Jennette

  46. HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY!! Hope you had a wonderful day. BTW, last night I finished reading your book…for the SECOND time!!

  48. Wow! A cake chronology–SWEET! (Quite literally!) Your time line reminds me of one of those Gestalt pictures where you can see two different things: some days I would look at it and feel inspired by your progress, but today I’m just excited by the prospect of birthday cake (sad).

    Rock on, sister sledge!

  50. Happy birthday!

    I’m wallowing in nostalgia myself, because the 90s were also my teenage years and I’m recalling my own vast T-shirts and grungy shirts as I look at your photos. (I’m a year older than you.) And I think we ALL wore the headbands in 1990.

    I have to say that although your haircut does improve, I think you look nice in the earlier photos too. The age 16 one is sweet. And you were clearly always a nice and interesting person.

  51. What a neat way to remember your weightloss struggles and just growing up. We all have those pictures in front of our birthday cakes. How very interesting to look at them all together! You have come such a long and way and should be immensely proud of yourself. There’s nothing better than cake to tell a story! Yum!

  52. Happy Birthday! Yesterday was my birthday too and I remembered on Sunday that I wanted to post a happy birthday to you. However, I spent my birthday in the dentist’s chair for six hours of fun and pain. Sort of wiped out any plans I had to celebrate later.

    Hope your day was a good one!

  53. You look so different between ages 26 and 27. I guess it could be the hair and no glasses and more weight loss, but I’m not sure. I feel like you look *older,* but I really can’t explain how. This is a great post!

    I hope your headache (BOTH the first and second layers!) are getting at least manageable, although I really hope they go away soon.

  54. Happy Birthday. MMM Cake. It is always funny to look back at old pics and see how you have changed. Things we thought were so cool in th 90’s are so funny these days. I am guilty of wearing sturrup stretch pants. Yikes I know! I hope you had a great birthday:)

  55. Happy Birthday yesterday!

    I hope it was a great day, great post. Thanks to Mom for giving us the fyi.

  56. Happy Birthday PQ!!! What a wonderful gift you’ve given yourself, as is evidenced by your latest birthday pic. You look mahvelous!

  57. Even before I read the comments and your mom said it was your birthday, I used my powers of deduction and realized it.

    HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

    This history is quite a record. Wonderful post.

  58. Hey, since you didn’t want to fish for a wish, I will refrain…

    But I do want to say how cute the age 10 photo is. And of *course* you were hanging on to your cake, looks like (your bro?) is totally ready to move in on the cake as soon as the photo is taken. ha.

    Thanks for this little journey back, it was a lot of fun. Neat to see some photos we haven’t seen before.

    What a lovely story with the last frame lookin’ so good!

  59. Yummm….cake! It’s definitely a weakness of mine. But it has to have buttercream icing. None of that whipped stuff.

  63. Hi, I finished reading your book and enjoyed it very much. I log onto your blog periodically and laugh out loud. Happy Birthday and keep up the great lifestyle.

  65. Holy Macaroni, Batman! That pic of you at age 15 was me! I had to double take! We could have been twins “back then”. Well, only if you were 15 in 1982…

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