The Party

On Saturday we got together with all of my side of the family (who all live nearish-by) at my parents' house to celebrate Zoe & Lucy's big 4th birthday. Everyone was there; we had pizza for dinner, followed by present-opening and of course cake. Out of all the pictures that were taken, there is NOT ONE where Zoe and Lucy are looking at the camera! Not even a picture with ONE of them looking at the camera. (The person in charge of the camera that night is really into "candid" shots and and that person was not me, otherwise we would've had at least a few "posed" shots in the mix.) So, here they are above, getting ready to have their candles lit, not looking at the camera. And you can see their cakes, for those of you who know my mini-obsession with making fancy birthday cakes for my kids. This year we didn't have much of a "theme" and they weren't fancy at all, but Lucy requested dark pink with butterflies, and Zoe requested light pink with flowers, so that's what they got. I always make separate cakes for them; these were 6" rounds, and I also baked a 3rd cake to make sure there'd be enough for everyone. I love making cakes!

Anyway, just as at Christmas, ALL of the girls' new presents are just right; they love the toys and they love the clothes (and so do I!) and we've had a great few days again of no TV since they have so much fun stuff to play with. I guess I'm starting to get used to the fact that their birthday is so close to Christmas... and I guess I'm starting to get used to the fact my babies are not babies anymore...

Update: Since y'all are SO nice about my cakes I'll go ahead & include a picture of the 3 cakes together. The middle one is Boston Cream (a B* family favorite!) and the two rounds are chocolate cake on the inside. The rectangular one was actually a 9x13 cut in half and stacked to make it taller & layered, so what you see is a 6.5"x9" cake, and two 6" round cakes. Two full cake mixes... and we only had about 3 or 4 pieces of cake leftover!

A cake-making tip: for yummy, always-moist cakes, bake a regular cake mix a day or two before the party. Wrap the plain (unfrosted) cake in plastic and freeze. I got these out of the freezer the morning of the party, and they're so easy to slice for layering, very cleanly, when they are still a little bit frozen. Try it next time you make a cake!