an angelic birthday

 

In his Sunday best for Jon's birthday.

Wives do a lot to "influence" their husbands. Some change their look, their hair, the way they chew their food. I am proud that I converted Jon from milk to dark chocolate. One thing I can't change, no matter what, is his birthday cake. Always angelfood, made from a box (I offered to make it from scratch, but if he doesn't care, why bother?) with strawberries and whipped cream. I am a pound cake type girl myself, and while Jon has convinced me that angelfood is acceptable, even tasty to eat at times, I am not entirely convinced it is THE cake. It's a cake that you can toss in the air and it keeps its form. It has no butter. It has no butter cream, no chocolate. But it's his birthday after all, so I will make him angelfood cake whenever he wants. I might still talk about a multi-layered caramel/chocolate/nutella/ganache masterpiece though, just to test his loyalty.

One other birthday gift I gave Jon was the gift of accepting and participating in any and all plans he had in mind. During a morning walk, we made it to that fourth garage sale even though my feet were tired. I held back whining after a huge (huge!) bowl of pho that I just wanted to take a nap instead of driving out to pick berries (and what if Theo resists and makes life difficult?). We went, I loved it, Theo loved it. Seeing him pick a berry and plop it in his mouth happily was one of the greatest sights of my life. After I forgot to buy the angelfood cake mix (horror!), I went to the store at 10:45 (right when I was ready to go to bed) to get it. This is usually a Jon job. That I make him do.

So other than learning a valuable life lesson (or two), we had such a good time celebrating Jon's birthday. (another stand out meal here of course) I gave him several presents that were all surprises, and he loved each one. It felt amazing. He is amazing. Happy birthday Jon!