a very merry unbirthday

[mizkit]

My older nephew, wishing to space his birthday out from Christmas somewhat, requested a half-birthday, so the family got together today for a kind of combined Father’s Day/unbirthday party.

Between the hours of 8am & 2pm, I baked a rather complicated cake, made its complicated frosting, made vanilla ice cream, cleaned the kitchen 2 times, did 4 loads of laundry, emptied all the rubbishes, cleaned the kitty litter, made lemonade, and just barely managed not to die of the outrageous 80 degree heat.

Ted went out to do errands, and the first thing he said upon returning was, “In my defense, *you* sent me to the bookstore….”

(The take was 2 cookbooks for said elder nephew, who wants to learn to cook, as well as Naomi Novik’s TEMERAIRE, a book for Indy, and the next three books of the Expanse series.)

Post-erranding, Ted made a ridiculously delicious dinner of grilled veg, salmon, shrimp, & kielbasa, which we all sat down to eat with hearty appetites. We also spent a lot of time lounging in the back garden, where, among other things, I spent a few minutes leg pressing my sister, which is no doubt perfectly normal behaviour.

The unbirthday boy cleaned up nicely, with a whole bunch of *extremely* nice tea (he’s apparently really in to tea, who knew?) and cookbooks along with an offer of cooking LESSONS from my husband the professional chef, and a super cool katana-style letter opener and some other good stuff, and seemed very pleased with his unbirthday.

The cake and ice cream turned out very nicely–the ice cream was so rich and smooth it was practically obscene, which isn’t always the case with my ice cream; I don’t make it enough to be really good at it consistently–and the lemonade was appropriately appreciated.

I managed to walk 4000 steps without actually leaving the house, which seems a little ridiculous. I am absolutely shattered, and to top it all off, I’m coming down with a cold. But it was a splendid day and we’re all happy. Tired. But happy. :)

(x-posted from The Essential Kit)

Comments

[trilliumgrl]

My husband is a December 26th birthday and he states that 1/2 birthdays are DEFINITELY the way to go. Otherwise, you kind of get jacked.

[desperance]

80 degrees, you say? Pfft. We had 105 today. Which is the hottest I have ever been, I think, apart from fevers.

I like a boy who cleans up nicely. Can we have photos of the cake?

[alix]

Sounds like a lovely day! I love the fact that your nephew is into tea and interested in learning how to cook. :)

I saw your tweets about the 80°F and laughed; I recognize that being from Ireland by way of Alaska, that's probably obscence to you, but as desperance said...it was also 105 here in the Bay Area and, this morning, I turned the AC on at 7am. o.O

I, otoh, want to know what complicated cake and complicated frosting you made!

[mizkit]

German chocolate cake! It requires an inordinante number of bowls. And the frosting has to be cooked, which isn't really *complicated*, but it's more so than I usually do, so :)