Disappointment with cooking

This past Saturday Jeff and I had friends over for dinner. Newlywed friends back from a lovely-sounding honeymoon. (Hi Sage and Don!!). In honor of this momentous occasion I busted out some recipes and attempted to make different dishes for then meal. First up was baked sweet potato and homemade cinnamon butter. Well the cinnamon butter was yummy, but I've never baked sweet potatoes in an oven before and they looked - unappetizing. They didn't taste bad, but I think I made the pieces too small because they were really dried out looking when I finally removed them from the oven. However they WERE edible when smothered in cinnamon butter. My second attempt did NOT go as well. I attempted to make the following cake:

Almost Heaven Cake
Ingredients:1 box yellow cake mix20 ounces can crushed pineapple2 cups cold milk1 (4oz.) box instant vanilla pudding mix8 ounces cream cheese, softened12 ounces Cool Whip
Directions:
Prepare and bake cake mix according to package directions for 9 x 13 dish. When done, pierce cake with fork. Pour pineapple with juice over cake. Combine milk and pudding mix in bowl. After beating well, blend in cream cheese. Spread over pineapple. Top with Cool Whip. Can garnish with chopped pecans or coconut.

Sounds yummy, right? Well I started the cake late... and as I put the ingredients together for the final steps I missed the key ingredient. Instant vanilla pudding. Instant. I used regular vanilla pudding mix and I think that was an important distinction. Too much pineapple juice, too much milk, nothing solidified. It was one big yellow cake and pineapple mess. Our guests gamely tried a small bite, but trust me. The cake was bad. It looked like it had already been eaten. YUCK! I wound up throwing it out and I was very annoyed with myself. I had picked this particular recipe solely because I had the majority of the ingredients on hand. I was sooo proud of myself for being budget conscious AND creative! Sigh. It was not to be. Better luck next time I suppose!