Little Raindrops

Posts Tagged ‘cake’

He turned 2, so for his party he had two little friends (plus parents and siblings.) It was the perfect size party and a great time with our friends!

There were lots of balloons on the ceiling and the floor. Blue, green and yellow.

There were cheese and crackers, veggies and fruits, heart-shaped cream cheese and jelly sandwiches, ants on a log, and an assortment of juices. All of Rhino’s favorite snacks. For lunch the kids made mini pizzas. Rhino really loves his cheese!

Rhino loves to color and paint, so after lunch we took out large sheets of paper. There were carefully thought-out blobs of color on one, a beautiful rainbow and mother and daughter on another, gentle strokes of light blue and yellow on a third, then Rhino’s: large marker circles and goopy smears of handfuls of finger paint.

We were going to do presents after the cake, but Rhino snuck away and tore into them without us. I heard from the other room an overjoyed “Elmo! Elmo!” as he discovered his new Elmo microwave! I couldn’t say no then, and let him open up the deluxe Mister Potato Head (40 parts I never knew about!) and tote bag of Play-Doh and accessories. The kids were all mesmerized by the microwave until we drew them away with the cake.

I wanted to make a Blue’s Clues cake because it’s his favorite show. Tanja loaned me a dog-shaped pan and I dyed the batter and the frosting blue and did my best to resemble Blue. Rhino was so overexcited as he danced in his chair and sang along to the birthday song (“happy, happy, happy, happy …”), immediately blew out both candles, and lifted one out of the cake and bit off the bottom of the candle. After we recovered the wax from his mouth, we directed him towards his slice of cake and he wolfed it down in record time!

He’d never seen a party blower before, but it didn’t take him long to figure it out. Soon enough he was blowing it so the extended end would knock his cup over, poke friends in the head, and dip into his fingerpaint (and then roll up again, and extend on the blank paper making little party blower paint marks.) We partied for about two hours and then our friends left and he crashed on the floor, with blue on his face, next to his Elmo microwave. What a party!

We drove down to Hachinohe on Wednesday to check out the fish market. We showed up and stood in front of the door, but it didn’t open. We couldn’t read any of the writing on the door. A handful of Japanese people walked right up to the automatic door like we had, looked around for a moment, and left. We finally found an employee to ask in our extremely limited Japanese. Matt managed to figure out that Wednesdays are the only days they’re closed. Woops!

We went back this morning and made it in! Jen picked out some sake. We don’t really know anything about sake, so we couldn’t help much. The decision was made based on price and how pretty the bottle is. There are some very pretty sake labels! When we last went to the fish market, Matt and I tried squid ink cake. This time Jen and Rhino tried it, too. Yum! We also had some delicious, tiny dehydrated shrimp and saw lots of cute treats. Rhino was startled by a merchant showing off his live crabs. He danced to the music playing through the building and entertained the shoppers. We have to remember to go back to do actual shopping. A lot of the fish looked so good!

Jen and I wanted to go out one night to karaoke. I’d never been, but it is a big deal here in Japan. I know of a place right outside the main gate that we decided to try. I thought it would be a bar with tables and a stage that you get up at and sing. I was definitely not going to do that, but I’d cheer Jen on! When we arrived, we found that they are private karaoke rooms. We purchased a room for an hour and some bottles of water, were given some microphones, tambourines, maracas, and a control. We poked at the buttons on the control for about ten minutes before asking for help. The attendant showed us the “English” button (which we couldn’t read!) so we could browse through all the songs and artists. Jen had some solos, we sang a bunch together, we did some Christmas songs, I actually sang a solo, and then the workers ran in and interrupted our song, grabbed all the supplies, and kicked us out at exactly 60 minutes! It was all very goofy and the room was super hot, but we had a blast! Each room has a small kiddie section with toys and books, so next time I’ll have to take Matt and the boys!

I know there are sake bars around that serve sake in a traditional way, I just have no idea where they are. Jen wanted to try some, but didn’t want to crack open her new bottle. So we went to the bar next to the karaoke place and ordered sake. They asked what flavoring and Jen chose green apple. They mixed the sake with soda and green apple syrup, which I have never seen before. I’ve only ever tried it in tiny cups and warm. I had no idea that it was served this way, too!

Even though we decided not to celebrate Halloween, I am not against a good, candy-filled party! Our church, Faith Baptist Church, puts on a harvest festival, as many churches do. Matt had to sleep, but I brought the boys so Rhino could get some fun in. It was a good mommy break for me too as I got to hand off Heron to some ladies who have missed holding a little one. And right now Heron loves strangers and didn’t seem to miss me at all!

A lot of the games at the festival were a little old for Rhino, but we adapted them so he could enjoy them. There was a “Fishers of Men” game where you had to hold a fishing rod with a hook on the end of the line and pick up tiny plastic men out of a kiddie pool. Rhino got lots of help. There was also a Jonah game where you’d put a golf ball into a whale’s mouth. Rhino got down on his tummy and placed the ball in the mouth, but I eventually got him to roll the ball. He did successfully knock down the “walls of Jericho” (stacked cardboard bricks) by throwing a tennis ball. He couldn’t use the Nerf slingshot to shoot a ball through the hole in Goliath’s head, but he did slam-dunk it in if I held him up! I didn’t even want to bother with the “Blind Bartimaeus” game where you are blindfolded and feel around in a bowl of rice for tiny safety pins. I could just imagine the mess! There was a face-painting station and Rhino looked at the sheets of clipart and pointed to the colorful train engine. He sat still the whole time while it was painted on his face and it was so cute! The last game we played was by far his favorite — the cake walk! What’s not to love? There’s music and cake, two of Rhino’s favorite things ever! We walked around a few times as I held his hand and he kept trying to walk away. Soon enough all the little kids walking around in a circle wanted to hold his hand too, so I got to sit back. He got a little bored of trotting in a circle and would break free to dance in the middle of all the numbers. Whatever he likes! We did win a cake and he picked out a white frosted cupcake and ate that while dancing for the cake-walking kids. It was a great time and went on for seven hours, but we didn’t stay nearly that long.

Afterward, we headed to the Weasel’s Den to crash a birthday party my friend Sarah had driven down for. We met some new people and Rhino had a great time eating grapes and playing! I had found Sarah’s blog a year ago and really enjoyed reading it then found out that she comes down to Misawa (from the Aomori area) once a month, so we arranged to get together. We haven’t hung out much yet, but I enjoy chatting with her when we have and look forward to her future visits. Her blog is a great read, too!

This post makes 300 blog entries here! Not that I was waiting for this magical number or anything, but I did notice it when I went to post. So the cake wasn’t really in celebration of this blog milestone; I was just baking a cake for no reason. But post #300 sounds like a better reason than just because I was hungry!

My past cakes have been pretty ordinary. Chocolate or white cake or mostly just whatever the box mix says to do and slop on some frosting. I saw this recipe at Recipezaar (my favorite recipe site!) after having some cake at the last ladies’ fellowship that sounds like it could be the same thing or close. Matt doesn’t care for coconut and has just started a diet (he thinks he’s too fat. Hah! But it’s good for him to try to eat better…) so I know I’m on my own with this cake, but I still wanted to try it out. Well, I have friends I can share with … I guess.

Rhino likes to “help” me in the kitchen lately, which I appreciate! I can’t wait to cook with him and teach him things in the kitchen. For now, he just likes to play with silverware, the refrigerator, bowls, peek inside the oven, etc. Well, yesterday he discovered the oven mitts while Nicole and I were making tacos. He put both of them on all by himself and came barreling into the living room to show off his mitts! I’m not sure if he thinks they’re puppets (which he has gotten the hang of for the most part and really enjoys!) or if he just likes to copy Mommy, but it’s very cute! So today while I had the cake in the oven, I left the oven mitts on the rug for him to play with. He put them on and walked around for quite a while, peeking in at the cake and turning to show me his hands. I love it!

Usually I pig out on the batter bowls, mixers, and spoons by myself, but there were enough bowls to share this time! I took the batter bowl and gave Rhino the pudding bowl/spatula and then the whipped cream bowl/spatula. What a lucky boy!

The cake is yellow cake, topped with a layer of crushed pineapple, then a layer of vanilla pudding, then a layer of whipped cream, then some toasted coconut. Delicious! Before layering the whipped cream, I let the cake cool for a while in the refrigerator. I guess I didn’t let it cool thoroughly enough, because when I went to take it out of the fridge and cut a piece, I noticed all the whipped cream had melted. So it’s not all tall and fluffy like it should be, but it the whole cake still tastes wonderful! Next time (ohh, there will be a next time!) I will be really patient and wait to do the whipped cream for quite a bit longer.

We have five pregnant ladies (that I know of!) at our church right now, all due within the next couple of months. Friday night we had our first baby shower. Tatjana is having a little girl (Tianna Isabelle) next month. Charren hosted this shower at her home, we had a fabulous turn-out (mostly church ladies) and a wonderful time!

We played a couple of baby shower games, such as finding the safety pins in a bowl full of uncooked rice while blind folded. We also passed around a roll of toilet paper and were told to unroll as much as we use in one day (and with four pregnant ladies present at the shower, the roll went quickly!) After we all had our toilet paper, we were told that we have to say one thing about ourselves for each square of paper we have. Tatjana definitely tore off the most and we got to hear a good deal about her life!

I brought Rhino along because Matt has to work at night and it didn’t really occur to me to leave him with one of the husbands (which pretty much everyone did.) So he was the only little kid there and is kind of distracting (especially at a 3 hour nighttime baby shower!) He was pretty well-behaved, but still very energetic and noisy! When we were all saying things about ourselves during the toilet paper game, he’d often laugh after someone gave a fact. Charren gave a nice devotional about loving your children and Rhino let a nice big burp right in the middle! A lot of the ladies got a kick out of him though, and he definitely enjoyed the attention. Heather was such a sweetheart and spent the most time with him: feeding him (that’s why they’re now best friends,) holding him, wiping jelly off his face, giving him toys, etc. He sang/whined himself down on her and almost fell asleep until he scratched his face on her necklace and came over to me. It was a nice break for me and he is really starting to get friendly with other people, thankfully!

Of course there was cake and presents. Katy made the chocolate cake with fondant and some yellow-cake cupcakes that were both delicious! This is the third cake she’s decorated and it turned out beautifully! I have a bunch of cake decorating supplies and it’s something I’ve wanted to get into, but it’s one of many things on my “to-learn” list that just hasn’t made it to the top yet. We decided we should bake up a bunch of cakes in advance and then have a day together to practice decorating!

Tatjana opened her gifts as we ate the cake. She all ready has a little boy, but this is her first girl and she received so many cute girly things! I got her some wipes, a set of Japanese-style (they tie like kimonos rather than snap) newborn clothes (onesies, sleepers, shirts, socks, etc.), and I crocheted her a little blanket. She also was given a ton of really adorable dresses, a bunch of diapers, and a neat little Japanese activity gym thing. She definitely made out with the adorable girl-loot!

The next three ladies (myself included!!) are all having boys; two of us all ready have boys. I’m told it will be one big shower for all three of us, probably just a diaper shower for the two of us who all ready have plenty of boy things. That’s fine with me (though I don’t really want/need a bunch of disposable diapers because we cloth diaper, but we’ll see!) because I just like getting together with friends (and cake!) Tatjana’s shower was actually the first baby shower I’ve attended other than my own and it was a blast!

On Saturday, Rhino and I went to a 1st birthday party for Carson and Cole, two babies at our church who were born a week apart.

Rhino had a blast playing with all the helium balloons and their strings (so did the other little kids!) We spent about an hour just watching the kids enjoying themselves before we dug in to hamburgers and hot dogs.

Charren (Cole’s mom) and Katy (Carson’s mom) had kiddie music playing: “Row, Row, Row Your Boat”, “The Wheels on the Bus”, etc. and Rhino spent a lot of time just jamming out to the songs and dancing for the guests. His favorite new moves are deep, repetitive squats with his arms straight out or waving around. The boy is going to have awesomely strong thighs!

After all the food, the boys opened their presents. I gave each of them a hand-stitched felt ball, embroidered with their name and the year. After everything was unwrapped, the kids tossed it around a lot, so I think it was a hit! I still have to finish knitting up some little bear finger puppets as a belated gift. I just couldn’t get it all finished in time!

After presents we had cake! The party was baseball-themed and the cakes were very cute (and delicious!) baseball cakes with a trophy for each boy. Carson and Cole each were given a chocolate cupcake. Cole was pretty unsure about the cupcake, would cautiously take a little nibble from his dad’s finger, and sort of complain or avoid the cupcake for the rest of the time! Carson, on the other hand, immediately picked up his cupcake by its bottom, and shoved nearly the whole thing in his mouth!

It was a great time chatting with other moms, watching the kids play (Rhino loves being around other kids now!), and getting some yummy food! Happy First Birthday, Carson and Cole!

Last Friday was my 26th birthday. We had just gotten home from our Tokyo trip on Thursday evening, so I was really in the mood for a quiet, relaxing day. There wasn’t really anything excited to speak of! Matt was on “Rhino Duty” all day which means that I didn’t change any diapers or get feed him. If I wanted to knit and he was “bugging” me (he always wants to play with what I’m playing with!) then Matt would make sure he’s distracted and entertained. Of course, I didn’t want a Rhino-free day, so I got to play with him and do all the fun things! I got to read, knit, browse the web, and just veg — it was very nice!

Nicole called me up that afternoon to say that she and Mike were taking us out to dinner, my choice! That was super-nice so we didn’t worry about cooking dinner or anything. One of my favorite places to go in town is The Global Kitchen. It’s a cute little place that has a little bit of everything: some Japanese, Chinese, Thai, Italian, “American”, etc. It’s not all amazing, but it’s a nice selection and we like to go on Sunday afternoons because you order all-you-can-eat of about 20 different little plates. They have a whole big room devoted to families with children, which is really nice for Rhino. They have high chairs and a fenced-in play area with a small slide, lots of books, stuffed animals, blocks, etc. Rhino used to not care so much about all the toys, but now whenever we go it is such a blast for him! Mike and Nicole hadn’t been in a long time, so it was nice to bring them back there too. We had never been for dinner, which isn’t all-you-can-eat but they offer larger portions and a much wider variety. I had cheese rolls (they make the best cheese rolls I’ve found and I crave them pretty much every day now!), a big bowl of corn soup (Nicole and I love finding places with corn soup!), and some spicy pineapple pork curry. Delicious! There’s always something for Rhino, too. He loves the little panko-breaded chicken pieces, cheese rolls, some of Matt’s yakisoba, and some of my Thai coconut curry (he eats my cute little mushrooms and eggplant pieces, but mostly loves the bamboo!) It was very nice to go out with Mike and Nicole and was quite a scrumptious dinner!

On Saturday we had Mike & Nicole and Liz + kids over for dinner. We did a strawberry and kiwi appetizer (which Josh and Aime inhaled!) then meatloaf, potatoes and green beans. I can’t find my favorite meat loaf recipe, so I sort of winged it this time. It was very tasty, but really fell apart. The whole thing was finished off, at least! And Rhino probably ate twice as much as I did — he kept demanding more meat loaf! It may be one of his favorite foods (the only other thing we’ve seen him act like this towards is lasagna.) Matt wanted to bake me a birthday cake on Friday (he says he’s never baked a cake before!) but because we went out, I suggested he wait until Saturday. He made my favorite boxed cake: strawberry with white whip frosting. And he added cute little flower sprinkles! It turned out very well and was so sweet of him! When the Armstrongs and the Kisers come over we usually entertain with a Mystery Science Theater 3000. This time we watched Space Mutiny, one of our favorites! Josh and Aime kept Rhino amused most of the night. It’s so much fun having kids over and seeing how he reacts these days. He likes to chase them around and do whatever they’re doing. It was a nice night hanging out with friends and a very pleasant birthday!

We hadRhino’s first birthday party at the Weasels’ Den, which is such a great place for the kids! We rented a little barn-kind-of-place for 2 hours and Rhino was so ecstatic the whole time we were there! He had a blast crawling and cruising around the baby area, which is full of padded mats and castle pieces, mirrors, and giant building blocks. The Armstrongs (kids: Josh (5) and Aime (3) ) and the Kisers showed up for the festivities. We had pizza and pasta, chatted a bunch, and did presents and cupcakes.

Rhino received a gift certificate and cute card from the Kisers, a bunch of wonderful books in a pretty bag (Rhino loved the bag, hahah!) and an animal memory game from us. He was a little more interested in tearing the wrapping paper than he was for his little birthday celebration, but he was mostly interested in the ribbons and bag!

I wanted to make cupcakes again because it just seemed to make sense for Rhino to have his own little cupcake rather than a piece of cake or a mini cake just for him. I wanted everything to be colorful for him, so I wanted to make the cupcakes as colorful as possible, too. A few months ago I found a tutorial online for making pretty swirled cupcakes and had been waiting for an occasion to try it out. Thankfully the BX had a great assortment of paste food coloring! The technique is really very easy and turned out wonderfully! Our home just gets so warm that often the frosting would be too runny when it came out of the bag to make pretty, firm stars. Most of them looked pretty good, though! Rhino didn’t care either way, he just gobbled his little cake up!

It was a nice, small first birthday party and Rhino seemed to really enjoy himself the whole time. He didn’t get crabby at all and really likes being around Josh and Aimé. The Armstrongs and Kisers are our best friends here at Misawa right now, so of course it’s always nice for us to spend time with them, too!

Happy Birthday, Baby Boy!

You’ve made it through the first year — hooray! I have known that “time flies”, but I really can’t believe how fast your first year has zipped by!

You’ve recovered completely from the trip to the States and now you’re your usual self. You’ve gotten to the point where I can say now that you are sleeping through the night. You’d often wake for short, frequent nursings, but you’re pretty much finished with that now. We’ve also set you up with your own little mattress on the floor next to ours, so you won’t be sleeping (crawling, kicking, sprawling…) with us when your new brother or sister arrives. You seem to like the little bed more than the big bed!

You’ve become a bit more of a trouble maker lately! Daddy had brought home a package of napkins the other day and left it on the kitchen floor, which was obviously an invitation for you to partake in the napkin fun! You are getting a bit sneaky, too, and will push the limits to see how much you can get away with. Even though you know “no” and that you aren’t supposed to be playing in the trash or grabbing in Daddy’s bag of chips, you’ll still try to when we aren’t looking and check to see if you’ve been caught yet!

You’ve become so affectionate lately! You understand “hug” and will give us big hugs often. You even hug all of your stuffed animals. You’re learning “kiss” now, too, but haven’t yet mastered it. You don’t quite know how to pucker, so when you kiss us, it’s with a wide open mouth and dangling tongue! You’re so sweet and sometimes harass us with sloppy kiss after sloppy kiss! Most of your stuffed animals also now have crusty mouths and noses where you’ve practiced your affection on them.

We have planned for your birthday party to be next weekend because your birthday weekend falls on Valentine’s Day and lots of your friends mommies and daddies all ready have plans. Daddy and I wanted to do something special on your birthday anyway, so I made you some cupcakes and you got to open gifts from your grandparents! Unfortunately, we didn’t have too much time for festivities because Daddy was at work all day and then we had a church banquet when he got home, so we had your little party over his lunch break. You weren’t so interested in opening presents — maybe because we were hastily tossing them at you! You know how to unwrap gifts pretty well, but this time you just wanted to tear one tiny piece off at a time and inspect each bit. Daddy and I ended up unwrapping everything else for you! You received some really nice outfits, a couple CDs you like to dance to, and some fun toys! Daddy and I gave you a wooden xylophone, which you haven’t quite figured out yet. You like to tink the keys with your finger instead of the mallet, or use the mallet backwards and at a whole arms distance away from the instrument. You’ll get it!

You also had your first taste of chocolate! I made you some yummy cupcakes with chocolate frosting. You were mostly interested in licking all the frosting off the cake and playing with it and made a bit of a mess! You finished the whole thing and seemed pretty pleased with the whole experience! The next morning was Valentine’s Day, so we had a little teddy bear and small box of chocolates for you. You had a piece and liked it, but didn’t beg for any more. I had also given Daddy a bigger box of chocolate truffles, which was left out on the coffee table. You only needed 10 seconds to open the box and shove six truffles into your little mouth and all over your chest! It was definitely time for a bath and you were pretty wound up with sugar the rest of the morning!

It’s been such a wonderful year with you, Rhino, and Daddy and I are looking forward to another fun year with you! Happy birthday!!

Lots of Love,
Mommy

10 minutes ago I was craving a little bit of chocolate, so I decided to try out this Chocolate Cake in 5 Minutes! It’s a neat idea and worked out pretty well, but I’m not really a huge fan of chocolate cake usually. It turned out pretty dense and spongy, not as light as I generally like cake. I’m reading through the comments and there are some ideas in there to modify it that I may try in the future. It’s not terrible or anything, just not my cup of … cake. Try it out if you need a quick fix for your cake craving!