Another Sunday! Another Birthday!

Another day to party! Another day to celebrate life!

     And that, my friend, is just what we did!

Our second son, known here as Thing Two, was born 10 years ago, today.  He's been a wonderful, high energy, very intense in all things, kid his whole life.  Here's our day in pictures!!!!

 The call of the wild is to great for 4 young boys.

 Will come together for a picture!

Per his request: a plan cake with chocolate icing (homemade) and

crunch bars on top!

 Ten green candles, handled with no spit!

 Yummy!  Slice of cake with homemade vanilla ice cream.

Thing Two remembered that his brother got "10 Things about 'Thing One'"

and wanted his own too!  On actual page, his IRL is printed on the page.
As of now, still not comfortable using their real names!

 Long awaited gift card to Itunes!  

 Our attempt at controlling some legos!  This is for all those mini figs laying around.

Thing One got a blue one too ~ a week late.

Guess who forgot to wrap the two mini figs that went with this?

Yup, that would be this mom.  He didn't care!

He ended up with two knights

(employees evidently figure out some of the mini figs and label them.

Those are left under the register counter.  I had mentioned something about

wanting to know and six were pulled out.  Of the four I bought, 3 were

correct.  Thing Two was hoping for Chicken man, but got a second knight)

He was quite happy with his day and we were thankful for that!
 

Golden Birthday! Know what that is?

Have you had your "golden birthday"?

Do you even know what a golden birthday is?

Hope you'll go aha now ~ it is when you turn the number of your birthdate!  For our oldest, that happened today.  It was extra special in that he turned 13, on the 13th, in the year 13, and he's the 13th grandchild on my side.  His Golden Birthday.

So this is what a 13 yo looks like:

He got to open gifts early today, lots of Lego's for our Lego lover:

One of two mini figures ~ a plumber and a skater

Lego gift card

Home made "Lego Drive" sign for door or wall

First "teen" Wii Game ~ Clone War Light Saber tool

Revised Lego Book

Big green board

Big blue board

After church we went out for lunch at his favorite place to go CiCi's.  Think we've gone 3 years in a row now for his birthday.  Got home in time to start prepping dinner with a couple friends over.

Minute to Win it M&M game!  Tuba player won!

Another game, getting cookie from eye to mouth!

The CAKE!  Chocolate and Candy

For a few days leading up to his birthday, I hid 13 13s in various places around the house.  Today's proved to be more challenging and not all were found ~ how long till the last 2 are found?

Lovely photo, right?

Ran some errands earlier this afternoon and cam home with this stash:

How convenient that both boys have asked for a candy birthday cake this year! This should be fun to make.

Jennifer

P.S.  Here is a link to the cakes that the boys have asked for; I was bored and on hold one day, so I typed them into my blog!  :)

Birthday Cake

So comes the first, of a few, back dated blog posts!  This one is about the tie dye cake created for our boys when they had some friends over for their birthday.  Got the idea from a friend, Heather P., from Five in a Row.  She'd made one and it looked cool and easy!

I started with a white cake, which I'll type out the recipe at the end.  Once the batter was made, I divided into 6 bowls and colored them red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple.

 

Once the pans were greased and floured, I randomly added dollops of each color to the pans.  Didn't really worry about what color was next to each other.  

 Cooling before taking them out of the pan.  Already looks pretty cool.

Frosted with chocolate icing and cut. 

White Cake (Better Homes & Gardens, New Cook Book)

Oven: 350 degrees

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup shortening, butter, or margarine
1 3/4 cups sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
4 egg whites
1 1/3 cups buttermilk or sour milk

1. Grease and lightly flour two 8x1 1/2 inch or 9x1 1/2 inch round baking pans or grease one 13x9x2 baking pan; set pan(s) aside.  Stir together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt; set aside.
2. In a large mixing bowl beat shortening, butter, or margine with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds.  Add sugar and vanilla; beat till well combined.  Add egg whites, one at a time, beating well after each.  Add dry mixture and buttermilk alternating to beaten mixture, beating on low speed after each addition just till combined.  Pour batter into the prepared pan(s).
3. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 30 to 35 minutes or till a wooden toothpick comes out clean.  Cool layer cakes in pans on wire racks for 10 minutes.  Remove layer cakes from pans.  Cool thoroughly on racks.  Or, place 13x9 inch cake in pan on a wire rack; cool thoroughly.  Frost with desired frosting.

Happy Baking!

Favorit Cake Recipes . . . .

This is what I do while on permanent hold with our health insurance provider, I type out my favorite cake recipes, because I just don't buy boxed cakes anymore.  These are from Better Homes and Gardens, New Cook Book, copyrighted 1996.

YELLOW CAKE
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup butter or margarine
1 3/4 cups sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
2 eggs
1 1/4 milk

1. Grease and lightly flour two 8 x 1 1/2" or 9 x 1/2 inch round baking pans or grease one 13x9x2 baking pan; set pan(s) aside.  Combine flour, baking powder, and salt; set aside.
2. In a large mixing bowl beat butter or margarine with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds.  Add sugar and vanilla; beat till well combined.  Add eggs, one at a time, beating 1 minute afte reach.  Add dry mixture and milk alternating to beaten mixture, beating on low speed after each addition just till combined.  Pour batter into the prepared pan(s).
3. Bake in a 375 degree oven for 30 to 35 minutes or till a wooden toothpick comes out clean.  Cool layer cakes in pans on wire racks for 10 minutes.  Remove layer cakes from pans.  Cool thoroughly on rake.  Or, place 13x9 inch cake in pan on a wire rack; cool thoroughly.  Frost with desired frosting.

DEVIL'S FOOD CAKE
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup shortening
1 3/4 cups sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
3 eggs
1 1/3 cups cold water

1. Grease and lightly flour two 9x1 1/2 inch round baking bans or grease one 13x9x2 baking pan; set pan(s) aside.  Stir together flour, coco powder, baking soda, and salt; set aside
2. In a large mixing bowl beat shortening with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds.  Add sugar and vanilla; beat till well combined.  Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each.  Add dry mixture and water alternately to beaten mixture, beating on low speed after each addition just till combined.  Pour batter into prepared pan(s).
3. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 35 to 40 minutes or till a wooden toothpick comes out clean.  Cool layer cakes on wire racks for 10 minutes.  Remove from pans.  Cool thoroughly on wire racks.  Or, place 13x9 inch cake pan on a wire rack; cool thoroughly.  Frost with desired frosting.

Woo Hoo! Typing this out took 20 minutes or so, Cigna should be answering soon.

Something to be thankful for!

Today is Kevin's birthday. It's been a fun day for us. We started with chocolate croissants from Trader Joe's. These are the ones that got us started making our own after we tried them last Thanksgiving. Here's a few shots of what Trader Joe's look like:

Here's what they look like out of the package. You really need to read the the directions before going to bed, because it says to let rise over night.

This was the next morning; they rise an incredible amount.












Once cooked to a nice brown, they're light, flaky and good.













My yard sale find today. A guitar cake pan. For a dollar, I couldn't pass it up, especially for hubby on his birthday.















A home made yellow cake. Boy oh boy, does it smell good. Can't wait to try it!!!

Kevin ended up frosting the cake. I was beat this afternoon and napped for a bit.







Another thing to be thankful for today, we got the van back from the auto body shop today. Yeah!! It's more comfortable to ride in my van with having a few stitches.

5 Minutes

Do you have 5 minutes to create a mug of chocolate cake? Following is a recipe forwarded to me by my Mom. We've tried it and it's pretty good.

4 tablespoons flour

4 tablespoons sugar

2 tablespoons cocoa

1 egg

3 tablespoons milk

3 tablespoons oil

3 tablespoons chocolate chips (optional)

a splash of vanilla extract

1 large coffee mug

mix dry ingredients together

add egg and mix

add other ingredients and mix

pour into mug

microwave for 3 minutes (@ 1000 watt)

cool a bit

put on plate or bowl and eat

I don't know how high ours goes, but cooked it for 3 minutes and it was good!! Also, it will rise some but it doesn't overflow.