Saturday, July 16

"Happy Me Birthday!"

We did it, we survived hosting a birthday party for our two year old. TWO! Can you believe it?? It seems like almost no time has passed since we were driving to the hospital in San Antonio with a bag full of sugary snacks and tiny clothes and that moment when we finally met our purple eyed boy.


I'll keep this short and sweet but a huge thank you to everyone who sent cards, packages, messages and love, and to everyone who managed to swing by and join in the chaos today. Marty has had an awesome birthday!

Jo and I spent last night baking slab cakes and cup cakes and since baking has never been our forte I don't think we did too badly on the cake front! We had to make up the design... When we were working out what to make Marty for his 'two cake' and both of us quickly realised that is had to be a cockatoo. He has been obsessed with cockatoos every since a horde of 16 or more black cockatoos descended into out garden and completely stripped all the nuts off the hakea. Marty was entranced and kept wanting to rush out and help them by picking up the ones they dropped in case they missed some. He hasn't stopped talking about the even and since he calls them "tooos" we figured it was a good match for the cake. Black not such a good match so we went for the good old white cockatoo.


Not to bad for a design that came from an internet line drawing and my head. The beloved made a practice cake during the week because she could and I also think because she wasn't entirely convinced that I could cut the shape we needed out of a cake! Pffft... I has knife skills (although I do not want to see another banana lolly for a LONG time).


We also made slightly odd looking mini cockatoo cupcakes so the kids could have some cake without us having to hack into the main one which would a) either upset Roo or b) mean that those coming late would miss seeing it. We probably should have thought more about the construction of these rather than winging it 5 minutes before people arrived...


Of course we over-catered a little on party food but not too badly. The Roo had an awesome day even thought he started it at 5am (his choice) and managed to fall off a chair and smack his head on the table leg just before people arrived. Poor little mite. He was so exhausted by the afternoon that he went down for a nap in the middle of the chaos.


This was by far the most unusual gift he received, but given his well known love of cheese (a story for another time perhaps) it was totally appropriate and very well received.

He's been a bit train obsessed of late (thanks Papa) so I'm glad we somehow didn't managed to give him his Christmas present last year because today was really the perfect time for it. A Brio starter trainset with its own tunnel (tunnels are another obsession, as are train crashes).


One more day of crazy packing, hair cutting and leg waxing tomorrow then I'm off to the States at sparrowfart on Monday. I'm going to miss my family (not to mention all those new toys...)

12 comments:

Aaron and Andrea said...

Happy you birthday, Roo! Looks like he had a really good day, we loved the pictures of the cakes!!
I hope our cake-making skills match yours when it's time for cousin Sophie to have her own birthday cake.
Have a wonderful time in the US Jac.
P.S doesn't look like we can see your brother's show, do you know if it will come to the UK? We don't get much AUssie stuff over here other than neighbours and home and away.
Love to you three from us three xx

Freckled Sparrow said...

Those cupcakes were super yummy! Top job on the party guys, yay for Marty turning 2! Safe travels tomorrow. xxx

Big A said...

Whadya mean "obsessed with trains"? That's a perfectly normal, healthy interest.

Woo, woo! Chuff, chuff, chuff.......

Ruthie said...

Brilliant! So enjoyed this and loved the cake :-) Two things I must do when you come2stay... dig out the much loved Brio... and show you my cake book :-) concorde... the three little pigs... teddy bears etc have all made unique and happy appearances!Hugs2all,
Ruthie
xxx

Anonymous said...

Well I think the cheese car takes the cake!

Aaron and Andrea from the UK. You need a VPN server and you can watch Australias ABC through the internet.
We do that with BBC, so we can feed our addiction to "Escape to the Country"!

Here Here Papa. Train addictions were very normal in our home. We have had bulging suitcases full from Singapore, Japan, Germany.....and still there were not enough...Duplo, Lego, Tomy as well to name a few....

Anonymous said...

Um that was from Ruth F!

Anonymous said...

Um that was from Ruth F!

Anonymous said...

Perseverating.....

Michele said...

The cake was amazing girls, well done. He will have such happy thoughts of birthdays, as you do Jac. Love the Brio train and the cheese car take all, What a wonderful day, without the fall, for our Two year old grandson. Where does the time go. hugs and love from Gran and Grandad. P.S. Safe travels Jac and hurry back.
Hugs.x.x

Anonymous said...

Hi. My name is Linda and I live in Wollongong NSW Australia. I absolutely love cockatoos and have quite the collection. I have a few wild ones visit daily for a feed. I'm originally from Canada and had a pet one over there but immigrated to Australia a sadly could not bring him. My son has taken a liking to watching them too and his first birthday is coming up soon so I wanted to make him a cockatoo cake. I googled images and yours came up and I love it! I was wondering if u had any tips on how u did it?? What did u use for the beak? Is it fondant icing?
Hope u can get back to me. Thanks.

Jac said...

Hi Linda,

Hope you get this in time!

I made a basic cake - can't remember the recipe but a butter cake or even a packet cake mix would work. Then I drew the basic bird shape on paper and made a template to cut the general shape out. I completely cheated abd bought the icing in a box that you roll out - but not marzipan! It is just unflavoured white stuff. Cover the cake in a layer of jam to help the icing stick, drape the rolled out layer over and then shape it all close (and cut a wing out of spare rolled icing).

The beak is liquorice straps cut up and the crest is made out of banana lollies cut down the middle and flattened a bit!

Simple :) Thanks for visiting. x Jac

Unknown said...

I stumbled upon your cake trawling the internet for cockatoo cakes for my soon-to-be one year old, who's known as "Cocky" because he had a habit of screeching - thankfully now gone but the nickname sticks. Anyway, what a cake! And I think the cupcakes are terrific too! I hope you don't mind that I will using both as inspo for mine... feeling daunted. -Lexi