Seven Years and Counting

Happy Birthday to my sweet baby boy! Seven years ago today I was trying to politely keep my eyes open (with little success) as people came to visit you. I was slightly exhausted from the events of the prior evening.

I went in for a routine appointment and (as with all 3 of my kids) he told me to stay and be induced because I was ready and he didn't have much going on. Well, all that changed about 6 pm when he got stuck in a difficult and high risk caesarean and called to tell the nurses to stop my labor until he could get there. So they shut off all the drugs (except the epidural, thank goodness) and we sat there for 5 hours until Dr. Houck could finish up the surgery, go home and eat supper and come back for the 20 minutes it took to deliver you.

Needless to say by the time it was all over with and I was snuggled down in my bed for the night it was close to 3 am. So those 8 am visitors had to deal with a very sleepy mommy. Somehow I don't think they cared.

So happy birthday to my boy who still wants to snuggle in bed with me and sit on my lap during prayer time. To the Star Wars fan and SpongeBob watcher. To the baseball player and shoe straightener. To the instigator and the helper. We love you!

Now...the party!!

By now you should all know that we rarely do the traditional birthday cake. This year I decided to to cookies. Mainly because I found some that were so cute I just couldn't resist making them.

While cruising around on my favorite cookie decorators blog I found these adorable cookie cutters. I had to have them. So I zipped over to Williams Sonoma and ordered them on the spot. They are the best cookie cutters ever! They cut out the cookie, emboss it with the lines for decorating and push it out of the mold all in one simple push of the button. Not to mention the fact that they are perfect for my family of Star Wars enthusiasts.

For the Darth Vader cookies I made Bridget's chocolate cookies and used this recipe for the black decorator icing. For the Storm Troopers I used Bridget's favorite sugar cookie recipe, the decorator icing again and my own icing recipe to cover the bulk of the cookie.

My Favorite Sugar Cookie Icing

1 cup powdered sugar

1 egg white

1/8 tsp. cream of tartar

Mix it all up. It will be runny. Just dip the cookie in, let the excess drip off and lay flat to dry. It will dry hard. It needs to dry completely before adding the decorator icing on top or you may get some bleeding of the colors (like I did on the storm troopers).

Of course there were lots of presents, some Slip-n-Slide action, a couple of baseball games and time with family to enjoy too. Overall it was another great year celebrated with two fun birthday parties.

Happy Birthday Cainan, we love you!