Restoring my faith in humanity. Or at least in customer service.

When Maggie agreed to have her birthday party at The Little Gym, I thought I had gotten off easily. Initially, she'd said she wanted a costume party at our neighborhood playground/pavilion. Easy enough, right? Except that she also said she wanted an Abby Cadabby theme. I could have easily done an Abby Cadabby party (or so I thought at the time), or I could have easily done a costume party with a Halloween/fall theme. But combining the two? I was at a loss, especially when Maggie said she wanted to stick with her Clifford Halloween costume, rather than switch to Abby.

So imagine my delight when we were at TLG for a makeup class and I suggested having her party there. She was immediately agreeable -- she loves gymnastics -- and I made sure to remind her multiple times that there would be no costumes involved at TLG. She was OK with this, so I paid my deposit and patted myself on the back for scoring such an easy party ... all I had to do was bring a cake and prepare treat bags.

Little did I know the cake would present such a challenge. Abby Cadabby is a fairly new Sesame Street character, and she's not yet included in the cake repertoires of many local bakeries. Scratch that. What I meant to say is that she's not yet included in the repertoires of ANY local bakeries. Every place I called -- from the big chains down to independent bakers -- all said they couldn't "draw" her due to licensing limitations (which I don't get at all since they will do other Sesame Street characters ... wouldn't the license pertain to the production company or entire show line, rather than each individual character?). I fell back on Plan B, but my calls to a friend-of-a-friend who bakes cakes on the side went unreturned.

Then I found one. One oasis of helpfulness in my desert of rejection. I won't mention them here, just in case there are real legal issues involved in what they're about to do for me, but they're a local, independent bakery, and they were totally agreeable to changing Abby's image ever-so slightly to avoid the licensing issue while still making her image look basically the same ... especially to a 4-year-old. Paradise.

My other challenge was the preschool birthday treat. Students are invited to bring a special treat for snack time. But Maggie's class includes a student who is severely allergic to tree nuts, peanuts, and egg. When other kids bring in birthday snacks, G usually eats her own special snack, at least according to Maggie. I wanted desperately to find something G could share -- imagine how hard it would be to never get to enjoy the same treats as your friends -- but again I hit roadblock after roadblock. The nut issue wasn't as big a deal as the egg issue ... evidently our local bakeries have never, ever heard of an eggless cake. I toyed with the idea of trying to make them myself, but that felt like too much pressure since I'd have to bake them on Maggie's actual birthday.

Then I thought of the Village Market. VM is a vegetarian grocery store in an Adventist community, and some of their products are even vegan. Vegans don't eat eggs, so I thought perhaps the VM's deli could make special egg- and nut-free cupcakes for me. I checked there today and was referred to the deli manager. Turns out, the deli doesn't really offer baked goods, but Lisa offered to ...

(wait for it)

... MAKE THE CUPCAKES IN THE KITCHEN OF HER OWN HOME.

Can you believe that? She is going to use an egg-free recipe and will wash all the dishes in the dishwasher first to avoid nut cross-contamination. She even gave me my choice of cake flavor and icing color/decoration ... I was so giddy that I didn't even care. I told her whatever was most basic and easiest was fine with me; I'm just thrilled to have found someone who will do this for me. After a week of calling and driving all over town and encountering some terrifically rude bakers in the process, Lisa's generous offer poured over me like a precious gift.

So here's a shout-out to Lisa and everyone in Collegedale. Thank you for restoring my faith in humanity just a little bit.