Matthew and I celebrated our birthdays recently. We had fun.

My birthday morning

I had a good birthday. It was quiet. I woke up and got given breakfast in bed and some presents. One particular present is rather awesome, actually, so I felt very lucky and spoilt! I had a good day at work. We went out for dinner and the kids are so well behaved when we go out that it’s always pleasant to do the family dinner thing. We came home and had the cake that Monte and the children had made for me. I was very happy to spend a lovely time with my family – the best gift of all. Actually, the highlight of my day was Matthew singing “Happy Birthday” to me. The small things!

Birthday dinner

The bump on my birthday.

Birthday cake. Chocolate and strawberries!

Matthew had a good birthday too. He woke up early, very excited to finally be four! We gave him his presents. Lego and a football were a hit. We got ready for his Pirate party. Monte decorated the cake and I tried to clean the house. It took MG 2-3 hours to decorate the cake. It was fantastic. Everybody loved it. It was hard to cut it into little pieces but we did it. People even took time out from praising the cake decoration to comment on the yumminess of the actual cake – a new recipe for me, where you melt the butter in some milk before mixing all the ingredients together. I called it ‘chocolate milk’ cake because it smelled like chocolate milk (recipe follows).

MG assembling the cake

The extraordinary Pirate Ship cake

Matthew and his cake

Anyway, the party was a great success. The children loved dancing and playing the musical instruments. They got out the trainset and made a huge train track in our lounge room. We had moved all the furniture to the walls and the space was big and the kids could run around with their streamers and balloons and play. It was great! They spent a lot more time playing than eating, which was good because we didn’t serve a lot of food: cookies, CC’s, sausage rolls and cake. And rice balls and lollies. There was plenty.

A party must be good if people dance!

Matthew and friends

The birthday boy

Matt had a good day. It was a quiet evening when Georgia went to her friend’s for a sleepover. Matthew played with all his (gorgeous) presents and the house was very quiet as we rested the day away. Phew.

Thanks to everybody who celebrated our birthdays with us in various ways. We’ve been really blessed by great friends and family. Birthdays are different for us, living away from family and friends, and I often miss people much more around our birthdays. Celebrating with and around people is always very much treasured. Thank you.

Chocolate cake recipe –  from “Party Cakes”

110g butter
1 cup milk
1 1/2 cups SRF
1/2 cup cocoa
1 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla essence.

Preheat oven (180) and grease cake tin (I used 23 cm but you could use 20cm or whatever)

Melt the butter in a saucepan with milk

Sift flour and cocoa. Add remaining ingredients and beat until thick and smooth.

Add the butter/milk concoction. Mix in.

Bake in oven. Approx 45 minutes or until cooked (use skewer to check).

Cool completely – eg 24 hours – before icing, otherwise icing goes crap.

Serve.

;)