Half birthdays, etc.

When we had just one child, it seemed like a fun idea to celebrate half birthdays as well as "real" birthdays. We did not foresee the impact this half birthday recognition would have on our cake making frequency as we added more children to the family. Now we celebrate some sort of birthday 8 times a year. That's a ton of cake, so I decided to start making tiny cakes whenever possible to reduce the calories/work. This one is for Son3's 1.5 birthday, which was actually over a week ago, but got lost in the Halloween preparations. It is chocolate with chocolate icing and white chocolate melted and piped into circles to make the polka dots. I got the idea for the polka dots from this amazing cake book I picked up at the library. Truly a beautiful and inspiring book - I can't wait to try some of the more complicated chocolate decorating ideas.

I would love to find a tiny cake stand that would better suit the smaller cakes, but my 1970's cake keeper passed down from my dad does the job for now.

In other news, the most wonderful package arrived in the mail today from my friend Lisa. Behold:



Lisa is the Queen of Good Mail. She has been making me mix tapes/CDs since we were sixteen in an effort to broaden my musical horizons. Her efforts have been largely unsuccessful, but it's sweet of her to keep trying after all these years. There was also a bar of imported milk chocolate, but it has already gone into hiding so as not to be spotted by the littles. Maybe I will graciously volunteer to take Son1 to his indoor soccer game this week so that I can read my glossy new magazines, oops, I mean cheer him on in his athletic pursuits.