Gary's Birthday Cake Disaster

SpongeBob woke up extra early on a very special day - it was Gary's birthday!

"Today's the day, Gary!" SpongeBob whispered. "I'm going to make you the best birthday cake ever!"

Gary was still sleeping, so SpongeBob tiptoed to the kitchen to surprise him.

"Let's see," SpongeBob said, pulling out his cookbook. "To make a chocolate birthday cake, I need flour, sugar, cocoa powder, eggs, butter, milk, baking powder, baking soda, vanilla extract, and salt!"

He gathered all the ingredients on the counter and got to work.

First, SpongeBob needed to measure the flour. He grabbed a big bag and started pouring it into a measuring cup, but he poured too fast. POOF! A cloud of white flour exploded into the air, covering SpongeBob's face and settling all over the counter.

"Oops!" SpongeBob giggled, wiping flour off his nose. But he kept going.

Next came the sugar. SpongeBob scooped it from the canister, but the measuring cup slipped from his hands and sugar scattered across the floor like tiny white crystals.

"I'll clean that up later!" SpongeBob said, crunching through the sugar as he reached for the cocoa powder.

He opened the cocoa powder container and a brown cloud poofed out, dusting everything nearby in chocolate powder. SpongeBob sneezed, sending even more cocoa into the air.

Now he needed to crack the eggs. SpongeBob tapped the first egg on the bowl's edge, but he hit it too hard. SPLAT! The egg exploded, with yolk dripping down the side of the bowl and egg white splashing onto the floor.

"That's okay, I have more eggs!" SpongeBob said optimistically.

He cracked the second egg, but a piece of shell fell into the batter. When he tried to fish it out with his fingers, he knocked the bowl, and some of the mixture sloshed onto the counter.

For the third egg, SpongeBob was extra careful - too careful. He barely tapped it and nothing happened. So he squeezed it, and the entire egg crushed in his hand, oozing between his fingers.

"Well, three eggs are in there... somewhere," SpongeBob shrugged.

Next, he needed to add a stick of butter. But the butter was cold and hard from the refrigerator. SpongeBob tried to cut it, but it shot out from under the knife and flew across the kitchen, landing with a SPLAT against the wall.

"Butter is supposed to go IN the cake," SpongeBob muttered, scraping it off the wall and plopping it into the bowl.

He poured in the milk, but didn't stop pouring in time. Milk overflowed from the measuring cup, creating a white puddle on the counter that dripped onto the floor.

Then came the baking powder and baking soda - two different white powders in similar containers. SpongeBob got confused about which was which and accidentally dumped way too much of both into the batter.

"That should be fine!" he said hopefully.

For the vanilla extract, SpongeBob opened the tiny bottle and tried to measure one teaspoon. But his spongy fingers were slippery from the butter and egg, and he dropped the entire bottle into the batter. Vanilla extract glugged out before he could fish the bottle out.

"Extra vanilla means extra flavor!" SpongeBob reasoned.

Finally, he needed a pinch of salt. But when SpongeBob grabbed the salt shaker, the top wasn't screwed on properly. The entire shaker's worth of salt dumped into the mixture.

"Oh no! That's too much salt!" SpongeBob panicked, trying to scoop some out, but only succeeded in getting cake batter all over his hands.

Now it was time to mix everything together. SpongeBob turned on the electric mixer on the highest speed right away. The beaters spun wildly, flinging chocolate batter in every direction - onto the walls, onto the ceiling, onto SpongeBob's face, and all over the cabinets.

"AHHH! SLOW DOWN!" SpongeBob yelled, trying to control the mixer. He finally found the off switch, but not before the entire kitchen was splattered with chocolate batter.

When he looked in the bowl, there was barely any batter left.

"Well... that's probably enough for a small cake," SpongeBob said, scraping what remained into a cake pan.

He put the pan in the oven and set the timer. While the cake baked, SpongeBob looked around the kitchen. There was flour dust everywhere, sugar crunching underfoot, egg shells and yolk on the floor, butter smeared on the wall, milk puddles on the counter, cocoa powder coating the cabinets, and chocolate batter dripping from the ceiling.

"Uh oh," SpongeBob said. "I should probably clean this up before Gary sees."

He grabbed a mop, a sponge, and a bucket and started cleaning. He wiped the chocolate batter off the walls - it had already started to dry and was sticky. He swept up the sugar and flour, creating another cloud of white dust that made him sneeze seven times in a row.

He scrubbed the butter off the wall, mopped up the milk puddles, and wiped cocoa powder off every surface. It took him almost an hour of hard scrubbing.

DING! The oven timer went off.

SpongeBob opened the oven and pulled out the cake. It had risen way too much from all the extra baking powder and baking soda, and then collapsed in the middle, creating a sad, sunken crater. It also smelled very strongly of vanilla and tasted incredibly salty from the mishaps.

"Oh no," SpongeBob said, looking at the lopsided, sunken, overly-vanilla, too-salty cake. "This is a disaster!"

Just then, Gary slithered into the kitchen and meowed curiously.

"Happy birthday, Gary!" SpongeBob said weakly, holding up the sad cake. "I... I tried to make you a special cake, but I made a huge mess and the cake came out all wrong."

Gary looked at the cake, then at SpongeBob, who had chocolate batter in his hair and flour on his nose. Gary meowed softly and nuzzled against SpongeBob's leg.

"You're not mad about the mess?" SpongeBob asked.

Gary meowed happily, which meant "I love that you tried so hard for my birthday."

SpongeBob smiled. "You know what? The cake might not be perfect, but I made it with love! Want to try a piece anyway?"

They both tried the cake. It was salty, overly vanilla-flavored, sunken in the middle, and a bit lopsided. But Gary ate it happily because SpongeBob had made it just for him.

"Next year," SpongeBob said, hugging his snail, "maybe we'll go to the bakery. But I'm glad I tried!"

Gary meowed in agreement, and they spent the rest of the day celebrating together - with much less mess.

The End.