Birthdays are Fun

Aunt Kaity celebrated her 20th birthday on February 27th, but with her spring break trip and our vacation to Florida, we didn't have a chance to give her her gift. So, she came over last night for pesto pasta and birthday cake to celebrate. Anna loves birthdays these days, even if she's not the birthday girl. She gets so excited about wrapping and giving presents, making (and eating) birthday cake, and singing "Happy Birthday" to anyone (even her stuffed animals and dolls).

I couldn't drag Anna outside yesterday with the cake-making and present-wrapping going on. I don't remember the last time I made something from a box, but I found this cake mix and frosting from Cherrybrook Kitchen that is dairy, soy, and nut free, and was excited to give it a try. I'm glad I did...it was delicious and so much easier than homemade. Anna gladly stirred the mix, licked the bowl, and washed all the dishes when we were done.

Something (maybe Elmo) had given Anna the idea that she wanted to finger paint yesterday, too. I didn't have any fingerpaints and didn't feel like making the homemade variety, but I did have some of the prepared frosting from Cherrybrook Kitchen that I'd opened a few weeks ago. It was going to go bad, so we watered it down a bit and played with it like we do Daddy's shaving cream. Fun, sticky stuff!

Making designs in the frosting.

Washing dishes.

I didn't like this frosting for the cake as well as the box version. It was great for finger painting, though. Although the box called for margarine and rice milk, I used coconut oil (Aunt Kaity loves coconut and it's much healthier) and rice milk. We all loved it.

After we wrapped Aunt Kaity's present, Anna wanted to wrap some presents for herself, too. So I found some paper to play with and she wrapped and opened book after book.

Frosting the cake.

Singing to Aunt Kaity.