Happy birthday to my amazing seven(!) year-old! This child has taught me so much about who I am and who I want to be - she's the gift that transformed my life. She has a strong and sweet personality - curious and persistent and full of creative ideas. She can be shy and tentative at times too. Almost daily she writes me a love note, I am a lucky mama!
We recently celebrated Natalie's golden birthday and what a fun celebration it was! We started a few weeks in advance by reading Isabel Wyatt's Seven Year Wonder Book and I loved hearing N's intake of breath when we read the chapter (first thing birthday morning) where the main character turns seven. This book is very sweet and full of fantastic stories, which we really enjoyed and will read again! It really set the stage for the joys of being seven.
On N's birthday, she woke covered in gold sparkles! They are still evident in her hairline, despite repeated swims and baths. (Found a lot under the bed too!) There were some magic gifts from the fairies and the friendly dragon who visits our home, gifts from us, and a bouncy house! Both girls had been adamant that a bouncy house was going to appear for their birthdays, so we thought since a golden birthday comes but once a bouncy house would be fun. And it was.
We had a lovely family celebration with N's requested dinner of rabbit and squash and used the coconut cake and frosting recipe with some new changes, inspired by this recipe. We liked it even better this time! I used about a half cup extra coconut milk and I did use the 1/2 tsp of baking soda, as well as added 2 tsp of apple cider vinegar. The ACV is a tip I learned from a sugar free cookbook for providing some lift without egg whites. This cake had a bit more moisture than L's, but was still nice and dense.
I used the same frosting recipe as L's and colored it a nice golden yellow using the juice of a golden beet and a bit of turmeric. I also added in the zest of half a lemon and that was really lovely. A hint about the frosting is that it doesn't spread like buttercream I worked with it like one probably does with fondant. I patted out pieces and smoothed them on. The frosting requires refrigeration and creates quite a solid layer!
We celebrated further with a party with friends, serving all GAPS foods we could think of that were golden-hued - yellow peppers, tomatoes, grapes, carrots - there were even golden eggs laid by N's hen (my first knitting project - I woke in the night and finished her as a gift for Natalie - she is purple with gold tail feathers, stuffed with golden wool and lays gold eggs of course!). Both L and N ate some egg white that day and seemed to have no issues. I wasn't anticipating introducing egg white that way to L, so watched carefully for the week and noticed nothing amiss. We will likely introduce eggs whites to her in the proper way at some point this fall. But I digress....we also had mango coconut ice-cream courtesy of the Vitamix. To serve four: blend 1/4 cup coconut milk (or milk of choice) and 2 cups frozen fruit and serve! What a nice easy treat that is. Birthday picture at some point! :)
No comments:
Post a Comment