Brithday Greetings...

Friday evening was spent making birthday gifts for a very special lady.

Happy Birthday Mum

Ben's Birthday

Ben's birthday was nearly two months ago when my computer was broken and I was unable to post. I had promised mum pictures from his party which we held in Fitzone. The children went off for supervised play and we were given a voucher and retired to the bar/cafe where we ate a leisurely lunch and read the Sunday papers. We returned in time for the food and cake (a treasure chest I'd made the previous day), then it was home to open the presents. It had to be the easiest, most relaxing party we've held.

Happy Birthday Joules

To answer yesterdays question most of you were correct in guessing that I had pre booked a taxi to take us home from the airport. I was very pleased that I had done this as it was approaching midnight, we were all exhausted so we were very relieved to see a man holding a sign with my name as we came through customs. We were even more pleased when the driver pointed out the queue for the taxi rank, it was more like three queues which converged into one somewhere in the middle. And yes I was smug because someone (who will remain nameless)wanted to just catch a cab at the airport although when he saw the queue he admitted that he would have been calling family members out of their beds to rescue us.




Today is Joules birthday and Ben chose to make him a lemon cake iced with Homer (after last years cake we were under pressure). Yesterday it was just the two of us at home, Mollie had gone to an ice skating party and Dillon was out with friends so Ben played the new playstation 3 whilst I made the cake. He then had the nerve to complain that I hadn't let him crack the eggs despite me asking him numerous times did he want to help. We didn't have time to ice the cake before Joules got back from work so hid it and got up this morning to finish the cake. I then discovered that I had two bottles of green and blue food colouring and one each of red and pink but no yellow which is a crucial colour for Homer. We were then discussing whether to just decorate the cake with Joules' age when he woke up so we served him breakfast in bed and he read out Ben's card which said 'I hope you like your Homer cake' so I dashed back down to the kitchen in a minor panic. Luckily after rooting in the cupboard I found a pack of colouring icing pens I'd bought in Lakeland in the UK in the summer and there was a yellow in there. I iced the Homer, Mollie iced the writing and we can't wait to taste the cake.

Happy Anniversay

Nearly a year ago I jumped on the blogging bandwagon, my sister had been blogging for a few years, then Dillon started his blog. A year ago today mum then started to blog as a way to spend a few hours of her retirement, next Mollie decided to blog as well so not to be outdone I decided to join the blogosphere. If it was not for mum starting her blog I doubt I'd be here today so please pop over to mum and wish her a very happy anniversary.

Birthday Greetings

Happy Birthday Dad

70 years young!

Fluffy's birthday and a Wednesday joke.

As you may recall Ben wanted me to make him a lemon cake when I was engrossed in Harry Potter When I refused he pulled on the heart strings by telling me it was Fluffy's birthday, funny that considering Fluffy was only purchased a few day ago. I persuaded Ben to postpone Fuffy's birthday by a day and then made a huge lemon cake and decorated it with a picture of Fluffy. It was delicious and I've a feeling another of Ben's teddies may be having a birthday soon!

My witty Wednesday joke once again comes from John, please go no further if you are easily offended.

Kenny- every parents dream child......................

A teacher asks her class, "If there are 5 birds sitting on a fence and you shoot one of them, how many will be left?" She calls on little KENNY.

He replies, "None, they will all fly away with the first gunshot."

The teacher replies, "The correct answer is 4, but I like your thinking."

Then little KENNYsays, "I have a question for YOU.

There are 3 women sitting on a bench having ice cream:

One is delicately licking the sides of the triple scoop of ice cream . The second is gobbling down the top and sucking the cone. The third is biting the top of the ice cream.
Which one is married?"

The teacher, blushing a great deal, replied, "Well, I suppose the one that's gobbled down the top and sucked the cone."

To which Little KENNY replied, "The correct answer is 'the one with the wedding ring on," but I like your thinking."

LITTLE KENNY ON MATH


Little KENNYreturns from school and says he got an F in arithmetic.

"Why?" asks the father?

"The teacher asked 'How much is 2x3,'" I said "6", replies KENNY.

"But that's right!" says his dad.

"Yeah, but then she asked me "How much is 3x2?'"

"What's the f..... difference?" asks the father.

"That's what I said!"


LITTLE KENNY ON ENGLISH !

Little KENNY goes to school, and the teacher says, "Today we are going to learn multi-syllable words, class. Does anybody have an example of a multi-syllable word?"

KENNY says "Mas-tur-bate."

Miss Rogers smiles and says, "Wow, little KENNY , that's a mouthful."

Little KENNY says, "No, Miss Rogers, you're thinking of a blowjob."

LITTLE KENNY ON GRAMMAR !

Little KENNY was sitting in class one day.
All of a sudden, he needed to go to the bathroom.
He yelled out, "Miss Jones, I need to take a piss!!"

The teacher replied, 'Now, KENNY, that is NOT the proper word to use in this situation.
The correct word you want to use is 'urinate.'
Please use the word 'ur-i-nate' in a sentence correctly, and I will allow you to go."

Little KENNY, thinks for a bit, and then says, "You're an eight, but if you had bigger boobs, you'd be a TEN!"

LITTLE KENNY ON GRAMMAR (Part 2)

One day, during lessons on proper grammar, the teacher asked for a show of hands from those who could use the word "beautiful" in the same sentence twice.

First, she called on little Suzie, who responded with, "My father bought my mother a beautiful dress and she looked beautiful in it."

"Very good, Suzie," replied the teacher. She then called on little Michael.

"My mommy planned a beautiful banquet and it turned out beautifully."

She said, "Excellent, Michael!" Then the teacher reluctantly called on little KENNY.

"Last night at the dinner table, my sister told my father that she was pregnant, and he said 'Beautiful, just f...... beautiful!'"

LITTLE KENNY ON GETTING OLDER


Little KENNY was sitting on a park bench munching on one candy bar after another.
After the 6th one a man on the bench across from him said, "Son, you know eating all that candy isn't good for you. It will give you acne, rot your teeth, and make you fat."

Little KENNY replied, "My grandfather lived to be 107 years old."

The man asked, "Did your grandfather eat 6 candy bars at a time?"
Little KENNY answered, "No, he minded his own f....... business."

Little KENNY is the best!!!!

It's party time!

To celebrate Mollies 11th birthday she choose to bring four of her friends to Clara Lara Fun Park. Yep folks this is the height of excitement here in the Emerald Isle. Luckily the rain stayed away although there was a bit of a cold wind. We spent six and a half hours there and returned home with a car full of exhausted children (and parents)!

Thank you all for your kind wishes regarding my egg buddy. The doctor I saw yesterday is also very confident that it is a benign cyst but I have to go to another hospital to get it removed. The doctor I saw cannot refer me to the other hospital so I have to go to my GP and pay another €60 just to get a letter of referral. How daft is that. Joules and I have been paying into a private healthcare scheme for 11 years and have never once used it as it does not cover GP appointments or A&E fees. Maybe I'll be able to use it to get my knee looked at sooner rather than later.

Happy Birthday Mollie

As you may be aware from yesterday's post Mollie is 11 today. She woke up a few minutes earlier than usual and had plenty of time to open her presents. She was a very lucky girl and got lots of things she wanted including a charm, wii game, cd's, t-shirt, jibbitz, sunglasses and some money (she now wants to go shopping)!

I was very pleased with the plate of pink and white fairy cakes and found some twisty candles for her. (Joules and I were making candle holders out of clay at midnight last night). These cakes went into school for Mollie to share with her class, they'll be a welcome break in between the exams they have today.

For all of you who performed rain dances or kept the rain with you so I could play tennis in dry weather, it didn't work! It rained the whole two hours I was on court but I won so I didn't mind!!!

Update: Look what arrived in the post from Auntie Sam.

A Final Birthday Post

Mum requested a picture of Ben's birthday cake, so here it is. As Ben's party was in the cinema we weren't able to bring a cake so I asked his teacher if I could bring one into school for Ben to share with all of his friends today.

I love making birthday cakes and have a number of books with cakes to inspire me. My favourites are The Australian Woman's Weekly Children's Birthday Cake Book and The Complete Cadbury's Cookbook. It is a tradition in our house that a few weeks before your birthday you peruse the books before deciding on the final design. This gives me time to source any unusual materials I may need. I never follow the recipe as I have an oil chocolate cake recipe that is delicious and stays fresh for a week, in fact it tastes better on day two than on the day it's baked. I just look at the pictures for inspiration and do my best.

This is the second time I made a dessert forte as Dillon had one about seven years ago. There are lots of cakes I'd love to make (some years the children get two if their party is on a different day to their birthday) and only one I definitely wouldn't like to make again, a castle! This is a picture of my favourite, I tried to persuade Mollie for three years to have a swimming pool but she always said no, then when she was eight I said nothing and she choose it. I should of kept my mouth shut before!

Ben's Birthday

Ben woke us up early. Well it wasn't too bad, 7:25am. We stumbled downstairs in our dressing gowns and watched him open his presents. Either he has finally learnt some manners or he really liked everything he was given. There was no 'I didn't want that'. Unfortunately one game he was given didn't work so will have to be returned to the toyshop, luckily Ben has a voucher to spend so I'm sure we'll be going there later in the week.

There was only one hitch at the cinema, you're not allowed to take large bags in. Unfortunately we had the food packed into four rucksacks, so had to give the boxes of food and drinks out to the children while Joules rushed to put the bags back into the car. The children, 16 boys and three girls, were very good and sat quietly throughout the movie, laughing very loud at the funny parts of which there were a good few.

Then it was time to come home and Ben had more presents to open. He got a great selection of gifts from power rangers, batman, Lego, art stuff, cars, football gear, a walkie talkie, dinosaur and games. I think you'll agree he's a very lucky boy.

Happy Birthday Ben

Here's my baby aged one and

here he is five years later.

As you can see from the photo our Ben is a bit of a character. He has the heartiest laugh you've ever heard which is very infectious, yet he is the only one of my children who can sulk and boy do I mean sulk. The head goes down and the arms get folded and he'll sulk and sulk and sulk. Then do one thing to make him laugh and he'll forget what he's sulking about. Ben adores Dillon. Whatever Dillon says goes, for example, Ben wanted his hair cut short and spiky. We were practically in the car on the way to the Barbers when Dillon told Ben his hair was cool and now Ben wants longer hair. We compromised and he had the ends trimmed! Mollie has to be the kindest sister to Ben. She looks after, gets him on the school bus every morning (often carrying his school bag for him) and clears up after him. Sometimes I feel sorry for her as he idolises Dillon so much, then he says 'Mollie is the best sister' and I feel everything is just great.

Preparation Day

I have to admit to have given up photographing my food. I could give you a thousand reasons/excuses (well about 10) but I won't bore you with them.

It's been mad busy in our house the last few days. Every free moment Dillon has been bag packing in Tesco with the scouts to raise money towards their summer camp. Mollie has joined him for five hours today as she will be leaving cubs and going to scouts in January. I was meant to help supervise them today but luckily they had too many adults so I was allowed to come home. This was very handy as tomorrow is Ben's birthday and I've spent the last four hours preparing for it.

It was very quiet in the house with Dillon and Mollie out and Joules studying so Ben and I had plenty of space and no distractions while we decorated the fairy cakes Mollie baked yesterday.


I put the icing on and Ben decorated the cakes. We had some large


and lots of small cakes. Next was time to make the party bags. I laid out the sheets of cellophane, Ben filled them with a toy, chocolate and sweets, then I tied them up. We thought they looked very pretty.


I lost my helper at this stage but continued to make the food boxes. We are going to the cinema to see Flushed Away and instead of taking them to McDonald's for a load of rubbish I decided to make food boxes with fairy cakes, Mars Bar cakes and a few sweets for them to snack on along with a bag of popcorn and a drink.


Now I can have a little rest until Ben goes to bed then I will be getting out the sellotape and wrapping paper ready for an early start tomorrow.

Another Year Passes

I've had a lovely day today celebrating the end of my 37th year. I awoke to a table full of presents and both my sons singing happy birthday to me. It was a quick rush to open the presents before Dillon was off to school at 7.40am. I was given vouchers, money, a book, a drink bottle for tennis, diary for my Filofax, chocolate, a make up bag and smellies for the bath, flowers and Mollie made me a lovely necklace. That's not even mentioning my early pressies of a tennis racket, a dress and my Kitchen Aid.

On the tennis court at 9.30am for my fortnightly singles game. Despite the freezing temperatures and icy wind us diehards play outdoors all year round. Today was a day when I questioned my sanity as I was so wrapped up you could barely see me, I couldn't grip my racket due to my extra thick thermal gloves and could barely connect with the ball as it whirled about in the wind. Even so I came off the tennis court 90 minutes later feeling great at having been out in the fresh air. After a quick shower it was time to meet Sally, who greeted me with some lovely flowers, for a coffee or rather peppermint tea and yes we indulged in cake and yes I photographed it as well!

We had a Chinese takeaway for dinner as I don't like to cook on my birthday, and this was followed by the best surprise: Mollie, Dillon and Ben helped by their Grandma had baked me a cake. Ben chose the design, Mollie make it and they all decorated it. I'm sure you'll agree that they did a fantastic job.

The World's Best Sister

When I checked my emails last night there was one from Sam telling me that my joint birthday and Christmas present was awaiting pick up from Meadows and Byrne in Dun Laoghaire anytime after lunch today. It was my 40th birthday present a few years early, she wrote. I was very excited as I love looking in this shop and dreaming about what I'd buy when I win the lottery. We duly arrived and I was presented with this beautifully wrapped box which was very heavy but I managed to carry it to car.

Mum wanted me to open it as soon as soon as I got home but I said no I'd wait until my birthday, so there it sat tempting me. I rang Sam when I knew she was awake but only got her voice message so thanked her and said I couldn't wait to open it next week. When I checked my email minutes ago there was a message from Sam telling me to open it now and not be 'daft'. Ben was very excited at the big parcel being opened.

Wow how exciting , thank you so much Sam. I'm so looking forward to making lots of yummy stuff and it will take pride of place in my kitchen.
I wish you were here with us, you're in our thoughts and we love you lots.