In which I took no pictures and you get to imagine the goodness.

It's my birthday.

34, baby.

Woot.

We celebrated on Monday 'cause it was Mr. Martin Luther King Jr's birthday and therefore a holiday. It's nice to celebrate when everyone is home from work and school. So I moved my birthday.

I was thinking about taking the family on a trip to the coast, or the snow, but decided to hibernate at home instead. We did venture out to the art store for a mini shopping spree for about an hour the night before, but otherwise - we didn't leave the lovely warm house.

I spent the day making things. Food to be exact. My family rather enjoyed this sort of birthday celebration I think.

We started off the morning with two different types of pancakes. I thought it was one when I was first reading recipes last week, but turns out I was flipping two pages instead of one. Since I had all the ingredients, I figured I might as well make them both. I used Mark Bittman's How to Make Everything Vegetarian (thanks, Jill!) and made the Light & Fluffy - Lemon Poppyseed variation pancakes (topped with powdered sugar) and then the Sour Cream and Cottage Cheese Pancakes. Both were pretty darn good. Good enough that they didn't last on the plate long enough to let the idea of taking a picture cross my mind. I know it doesn't sound as appealing, but the Sour Cream ones were pretty tasty. They'd be a perfect carb in a hearty eggs & ham sort of breakfast. Both were super light cause you beat the nonsense right out of the egg whites.

And then, perhaps because it's cold and wintery and I'm ready for some sun and lemon, I continued the citrus (along with the beating the nonsense out of the egg whites) theme with a Lemon Chiffon Cake. Except I forgot to add the lemon parts. So it was a normal (vanilla/almond) flavored chiffon cake. And then when making the icing, I figured shoot, "Let's get that lemon involved here" and made the lemon icing.

Yeah. I don't recommend mixing those two flavors.

The icing was great. And the cake was great. I recommend eating them seperately.

In centimeter slices if it makes you feel better.

That was my first every chiffon cake and I gotta say, I'm definitely making more. Yum.

And then I tried a roasted vegetables combo that was new to me (sweet potatoes, butternut squash and carrots) that didn't turn out so well. Unfortunately.

Sorta. 

Dave is a Maximizer and by this time in the day was going a little crazy with my haphazard cooking ways and wanted to analyze exactly what went wrong and how to fix it for next time, but I drove him nuts and said it was more fun my way.

Finally, we tried Pan-Searing some Filet Mignon. That was tasty. We also learned we like steak in tidbit form. We really just want a couple bites and we're all set. A whole steak is almost overwhelming. Lesson learned. Our budget likes it better that way too. :)

Ellen made me a fabulous coupon book full of choices like drawings and poems and hugs and high fives. I cashed quite a few of those in. Both of the boys made me bead bracelets with my name spelled out. Now I have one for each wrist so I'll never get confused who I am. :) Love it.

Dave finished the night off with an awesomely silly poem that was all about, well, I won't share here. :)

It was a pretty fabulous day full of making and trying things. My favorite way to spend my time.

Comments

[Bopp]

What a fantabulous 34th birthday. Hope you got my voicemail.

[Jill]

That sounds like a great day! Happy birthday!

[Emily]

Happy Happy Birthday! Your celebration day sounds awesome! Wish we were there to make things with you!

[wendy]

Well, where ARE you going to share, then? ;-) Happy Happy Birthday, Sarah! It was great to celebrate your 33rd...I can't believe it's been a whole year! I'm glad you had such a nice day :)

[sarah]

Me too Emily!
Wendy I'm beginning to think Papa Hydyn's should be a yearly tradition....