Birthday Week 2013!

Okay, so I started this post, like, over a week ago, and it's taken me forever to finish it.  Sheesh, it's not like I have 6 other people interrupting me constantly or anything.  (really?  six others?  how did we get to be that many people??)

N-E-way, we recently celebrated Birthday Week here in Die Gurkehaus (which is feeling more and more like a small jar each day...).   This year it started with a shebang, as we were joined by our cousins who hold the current record on March birthdays! (their 4 to our 3!)  One of theirs was missing, but we still sang to 6 people!

"Happy Birthday dear everyone..."

I have a video of the singing which I hope to post, as soon as I figure out how to change the file type.

Sweet Sasha, who was celebrating her first birthday!  yay!

the present-opening frenzy

Andrew loves his fancy schmancy cup!

This next picture has nothing to do with birthdays, except for the fact that the cousins were with us for St. Patrick's Day and Mr. Pickles made his Amazing Coffee Cake of Wonder(tm) for brunch.  Oh, and it WAS Aunt Katie's birthday that day, so there you go!

On Monday we went to the Museum of Natural History with the cousins.  We walked through the ocean exhibit, saw the Hope Diamond, visited the dinosaur bones, viewed the mummies (I didn't know there were mummies there!), and wandered through the insect exhibit.  We had a great time, despite my taking 45 minutes to find a parking place, two emergency bathroom runs, and trying awkwardly to nurse the baby in the wrap carrier while walking -- but everyone got to see what he and/or she wanted so we were all happy. 

And, NATURALLY, I didn't bring the camera!  Sigh.

You know, we live SO close to DC, and we never go to all these awesome things except when people visit us!

Anyway, the next day, Tuesday, was Miriam's 11th birthday.  It was a packed day!  To celebrate, we went ice skating at Kettler Ice Plex (home of the Capitals!) with some of her close friends. 

not bad for a lousy camera phone -- because, of course, I forgot the camera

 For dessert she chose chocolate lava cakes.  Good woman.

the candle had to be stuck off-center because the middle was all gooey and lava-y!

One of our neighborhood friends was being confirmed that evening, so after Miriam's birthday dinner the girls and I (and Andy of course) went to the Mass.  It was very special, and the bishop gave a great homily.  Most memorable was the lesson that the sacred chrism -- the oil that smells so good, and which is used at Baptisms and Confirmations -- is meant to remind us that we are to be a sweet fragrance in the world.  That lovely image really struck me, especially as our new pope seems to be one who will lead us in this by his example.

Miriam is really looking forward to her own Confirmation now.

Even though we didn't have any birthdays the next day, our neighbor two doors down had her baby that day, so the trend continues!

Thursday was Joseph's 5th birthday.  Our homeschool coop was that morning, so we brought brownies to share.  (Even though it's Lent, in our ecclesia domestica we celebrate family holidays with abandon.)

For his birthday, Joseph requested a strawberry hockey cake.  Since box mix is out of the question now, all our cakes have to be made from scratch.  I also wanted to make sure Mr. Pickles could share in the festivities, so I followed the Joy of Cooking's recipe for white cake, but used a gluten-free flour mix, and added mashed strawberries, reducing the liquid by a little bit.  So simple, and amazingly delicious!

not nearly as elaborate as this cake, since the tubes of colored icing are now verboten, and I'm fresh out of cake decorating bags at the moment

Joseph decorated it himself with a long, skinny candle made into a hockey stick and a chocolate mint for a puck.  He also insisted that the 5 candle was THE fifth candle and so putting another stripey candle on was totally superfluous.

I'm five!  I'm five!  I'm a big boy now, I'm five!

Finally came the big day for The Man Himself!

Mr. Pickles took the day off -- because who wants to be in an office on your birthday? -- and did pretty much whatever he felt like doing, a recipe for a good birthday!  Since it was a Friday in Lent, we couldn't go too crazy on the meals, but it was still what we call "a good food day."  We started off with french toast with mashed strawberries and whipped cream (I know, SO penitential), followed by quesadillas filled with tuna and hummus for lunch (which, I know, sounds weird, but with Trader Joe's 3 layer chipotle-red-pepper hummus, it is DA BOMB), and then for dinner, grilled salmon and asparagus with basmati rice. (yay for grilling in March!)  Are you drooling yet?

To mix things up and add even more variety to the week, he chose to have custard for his birthday dessert.  The first experiment early in the day came out... weird.  I don't think arrowroot is a good thickener for custard -- it came out... slimey.  The next batch was a success, although the kids thought it was too eggy.  No problem -- all the more for us!

On Saturday we held Joseph's birthday party.  When I reminded him of that in the morning, his eyes got really wide and he exclaimed, "Is it my birthday AGAIN?  Am I SIX??"  Even though we repeatedly explained, no, it's not your birthday, we're just having the party on a different day, he still refers to Saturday as his second birthday.

We invited some of his little buddies and basically turned them loose downstairs.  I am not a firm believer in organizing party games for children.  I figure as long as you minimize the amount of bloodshed, they are perfectly capable of entertaining themselves.  As it turns out, Katie has a natural flair for coming up with imaginative ideas for entertaining guests.  See the two princes above?  They were playing "kings and princes" complete with crowns, robes and thrones.

And of course, I didn't get any pictures of it.

the best part -- opening presents!

At every party, I've noticed there is one toy that everyone flocks around -- this time it was a truck that breaks ON PURPOSE when you crash it into stuff!

some party-goers were more interested in the resident rodent

 Joseph loved all of his gifts -- they were all perfect for him!  He had a great time, and I had a lovely visit with the moms who stayed.  I love hosting -- I really should do it more often.  Yay!  A reason to party!

Thus ended Birthday Week.  We didn't get a lick of schoolwork done, and are now 4 weeks behind, sigh.  But I've finally realized that Birthday Week needs to be our Spring Break -- who has time for school when there's so much partying to be done?