Happy Birthday to the Mr.!

Yesterday was Mike's birthday!  He usually tries to declare it a holiday and takes the day off work.  This year he's even declared it a four-day weekend so he doesn't have work on Monday either.  He told his boss it was a National Holiday - she said, "Only national?"  He said next year he was going for international.

We had to ship the kids off to school, but we enjoyed a nice breakfast of Mike's request..."non-runny eggs". I cooked them until I thought we'd choke on them then served them up.  They passed muster...whew.  Then we kicked the kids out of the door and headed to Caribou where he got his free coffee.  We got to spend some time relaxing and reading and chatting.  Afterwards we decided to head out on a drive for wherever the wind decided to take us.  We love driving around and looking at houses and different areas so this was a treat - and I'm sure the kids were thrilled later to learn that they had missed out on it.

We had asked Mike what type of cake he had wanted.  He didn't have any huge suggestions, but mentioned that his mom had always made a "Cherry Chip" cake when he was little and he was sure it came out of a box.  I was pretty sure it didn't.  Maybe it did in 1977, but I'd never seen it.  A little Google search and Duncan Hines provided the recipe.  After chopping a half jar of maraschino cherries, and staining my fingers an awful shade of red, we had this:

A very manly pink cake.

We brought it downstairs and had the traditional singing...

The inside of the cake was pink too.  Mike later said he was surprised there was real cherries in it.  He didn't remember that from the cake of yesteryear...dried cherries, definitely, but not the real thing.  He said it tasted good and Maddie liked it a lot so...thank you, Duncan Hines!

Presents were next.  Really, Mike had already picked out his own presents...he outfitted his bar with a bunch of 5-gallon kegs and everything needed to run his taps.  However, we couldn't have a birthday without something  to open.

He really likes a certain brand of shirt and had pointed some sales out at the mall.  Maddie picked this gift out for him.

Jake wanted to get him a beer kit, but the yeast wasn't available so instead we got him a "growler".  This is a jug he can use to fill up with the beer on tap and take it to parties or down the street to the neighbor's on bonfire night.

Mike had spent the afternoon watching some t.v. show on Netflix that he's been trying to finish.  He was only too happy to spend the afternoon downstairs with the sound turned up (lots of special effects...) and nobody around (ahem...me) to make comments on what a ridiculous show it was.  He even kicked the kids out when they started hanging out and wondering what he was watching.  Some definite "me" time for him.

Happy Birthday, Mike!