Cake and Presents

But first, a photo taken from inside my classroom of a visiting soldier bailing out of one of the playground swings. My students loved it. Go Army!

Now on to the cake. My husband loves cake. He grew up in a home where cake was a big deal--only for birthdays. His mom worked so hard on each cake! She bought special pans molded into special shapes and she spent hours decorating the darn things. I've seen lots of family photos and the discussion goes something like this, "Was that the year we had the Garfield cake?" Eventually, my husband grew up and moved away to college at which time he began cooking for himself.

One day, he took a closer look in the baking aisle and discovered (as in LO! and BEHOLD!) cake mixes. And frosting. Many flavors of instant frosting. And so cheap. So he read the directions on the back of the cake mix and found out this: so easy! He couldn't believe that it was so cheap and so easy to make a cake. With frosting and everything. And since then, he's been in love. Mostly with frosting. He may have even felt a teensy bit betrayed that his mother had kept this secret from him his entire life. So he went home, baked a cake, frosted it, and enjoyed every bite. He's been a fan ever since.

The first time he invited me to his apartment for dinner, he served cake for dessert and I must say, I was rather impressed that the man cooked, actually served a VEGETABLE, and had cake for dessert. One he obviously had made himself. Not bad.

A couple of weeks ago, he made a cake. It was a strawberry cake with pink frosting. He told me they have this new vanilla frosting that's already colored pink (or you can buy it in blue). It came with sprinkles, so, bonus! After the cake cooled, he asked me to frost it, because I like to take time making swirls and stuff. I decided to take pictures. I proclaimed to my husband, "Well, either we're headed for a baby shower or Easter dinner at Grandma's!

Now for the presents. At risk of spoiling the surprise here on my blog, I'm going to distribute these along with our class cookbook as we head out the door for Thanksgiving Break. It's one of the ingredients in the recipe that I'm submitting. Each one of us had to choose a favorite recipe/food and write an essay about "the story behind the recipe." I love reading why these children love these foods! One boy wrote what I thought was a charming little essay about how Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup just hits the spot, especially right after swimming. He explained how to open the can, mix the water, etc. However, his mother emailed and revealed that she had found the paper I sent home with guidelines for this project in his closet behind his laundry hamper! She made him do it over and his recipe is now an actual cook-from-scratch recipe.

It was soothing to be able to sit on the couch for awhile next to my husband on a rainy Saturday and tie a few ribbons around cute little bags. These small moments and tasks are part of the happiness in my life!