It all started with a teddy bear. Actually, it started with watching the morning news. I should have known better. I am not the sort that can handle reality before the sun. But for some reason, fate or whimsy, I tuned into the local station. Along with Obamacare panic, inauguration woes, and local robberies (one at a hotel disconcertingly close to our house\u2026I know because I Google mapped it), they aired a piece from Florida about a girl who lost her teddy bear<\/a> in an airport terminal in the aftermath of the Ft. Lauderdale shooting. This was not just any teddy bear. This was Rufus, given to the girl by her grandfather when she was a baby not long before his death. Luckily, the mom knew her stuff, and sent a desperate tweet, an internet call-to-arms. The ending? Airport officials tracked down the bear and reunited him with the girl the following day. I fought the tightness in my chest. I squinted and shook my head like a dog shedding water. It didn\u2019t help. I cried at 5 a.m. alone in my kitchen. But they were happy tears. Something good could come out of something terrible. A symbol of love could last a decade, be lost, and found, and childhood preserved a bit longer.<\/p>\n This was my made-for-tv mindset going in to the day. And that was my downfall. Part of the sentimental mumbo jumbo stemmed from the fact that all the kids were going to school and I would have a glorious few hours to myself after what felt like the winter break that broke the camel\u2019s back. I was enjoying missing them in advance. And as is par for the course with me, I got too ambitious. We were all going to eat a nutritious breakfast, everyone would go to school, get happily worn out, come home to another nutritious meal, and then do it up right with a homemade cake. It would be a yellow cake, two layers, with chocolate whipped frosting. It would be our \u201cback to reality\u201d celebration cake.<\/p>\n