It's My Birthday!

Most of the enthusiasm for a grand celebration of my 43 years came from the little girls. Once they got home from school they were gung-ho to get started baking a cake and shopping for presents. They found their older siblings less than willing to participate, so they got started by themselves. First for the cake. Rachel got the cake mix and Geral got the bowl. Most of the mix made it into the bowl. Geral was insistent that she clean up the little bit that spilled, because it was my birthday.

Rachel got the bowl to the counter and just needed help measuring the oil. (I for one was really grateful that she asked for help on this as I was taking the previous picture. A gallon of oil missing the bowl may have ended my good humor.) She got the water and three eggs into the bowl herself with just one of the eggs dripped down the front of the cabinet. Blissfully, she was allowed to run the mixer all by herself.

Both Rachel and Geral thought that I should get a beater, because it was my birthday, but they both really wanted one themselves. I assured them that I could live with licking the bowl which made them both feel better about not wanting to give theirs up for me. When it came to the spatula, they each took a side.

The batter went into a rectangular pan instead of the round ones that they like best because "you know, we are going to need a lot of room for all those candles!" Thanks girls.  When it actually came to it though, I was not so eager to rifle through the drawers trying to come up with enough so we put on 4 blue ones and 3 pink ones to represent the numbers. A little less of a fire hazard that way.

Ralph got me a marble slab for my birthday so that we can experiment with some candy making this fall. It is a very pretty piece of rock.

Once the little girls were done with their baking, which did not include wiping up, except for the incident mentioned above, they talked Lauren into taking them to Target with their dollar so that they could buy me a present, two nail polishes in a glitter pink and a magenta red. We used both to create a polka dot look before bedtime while the rest of the family was at scouts and mutual. Check it out!