My Mommy's Special Day

When I got to school yesterday morning, the first thing I worked on was making a Happy Birthday poster for my mom for the students to sign. When my three kiddos took up most the space on the first poster writing their names (really well by the way...look at the close-up pic below!!), I decided having two posters was probably necessary. :D After everyone signed it, I put the poster on my mom's school office door, so that would be the first thing she saw when she got there.

When she opened her office door, these beautiful flowers from the church staff were the next thing to greet her.

The elementary students sang TWICE to my mom during lunchtime. When my mom first walked in the front door, I couldn't let her get by without them singing to her. It just wouldn't be right! :D Mrs. Lytle had made a special cupcake tree, like she did for my birthday, so we all sang to her again when the cupcakes were ready. :)

After school was over, I literally flew out the door, so I could get home in plenty of time to get supper preparations underway. I had to have at least 2 1/2 hours of time set aside to make these DELICIOUS garlic knots. It was a new recipe, so I had no idea how they would turn out. They definitely were a yummy success! Mom had requested spaghetti & meatballs for her special birthday dinner, so of course, you had to have some sort of garlic something with that!

However, every year on Mom's birthday, I am reminded of the depressing fact that I did not inherit my mother's birthday cake decorating talent. I am sure many of you have viewed the pictures of the 23 birthday cakes she has made me for each of my birthday celebrations! (If not, just go to my October 2008 archive) Every year I get this "mental picture" of what I want her cake to look like, and well, it NEVER ends up looking like it!! I was flipping through my recipes, and discovered this fudgy chocolate layer cake that looked absolutely delicious, so I thought I would give it a try. Why is it that it never ends up looking like the picture??!! It turned out rather crumbly, and it was next to impossible to ice (icen?) it. *Sigh* The icing recipe turned out to be way too watery and basically just got soaked up in the cake, so I begged my wonderful brother to go out and get some chocolate icing at the grocery store. That helped a bit. I was glad that I had decided to decorate it with Nonpareils - one of my mom's favorite candy. Candy has a way of covering up errors!! (for the most part :)). However, this isn't supposed to be a rant on my lack of baking skills, so I will stop! Here would be the cake. It was made with love...and frustration! :D

Singing "Happy Birthday" once again :)

Blowing out the candles....

Cutting crumbly slices of cake

One of the presents we got her was a full cushion seat massager. Every Mommy definitely needs one of these!

It now resides on Mom's chair in the living room. The vibrating, heat massage is soooo nice! It will definitely be enjoyed by all!...hey, wait...I forgot...we got it for Mom :D