Audrey's Birthday - Take #3

Since John was out of town on Audrey's birthday, we had the official birthday dinner celebration today. Red Robin and their burger with a fried egg on top - YUMMO!

And of course Audrey's favorite dessert, Marie Callendar's Chocolate Satin Pie.

Milwaukee

I should have John write this post...maybe I'll have him edit it later : )

John was set to head to Milwaukee for more computer training for his job. This time he also went with a co-worker. He was flying out on Sunday in the early afternoon, so was going to attend church and then Audrey would drive him to the airport as I had to teach the Relief Society lesson today. Right before church I got a message that his flight had been cancelled.. and that the airlines idea of a solution was to fly him out not Monday, but Tuesday morning. His classes were Mon-Tues-Wed-Thurs so would have missed at least one day and most of the second day. So he got on-line and found a flight that was not direct, but would get him there. He left around 1pm and arrived in Milwaukee about midnight their time.

He brought the camera with him and had his co-worker snap a few photos during their trip. I really thought this one was great:

Audrey's Birthday - Take 2

Audrey had one more present to open. She will be able to use her new computer when she attends college, plus she will be able to use it for her senior project in a few weeks.

Car

We went on a car hunt for Audrey. Trying to find something not too old, with not too many miles. We found a couple of cute cars - one had been wrecked, one had been sold and one had been totalled and then re-built. We had been looking for a number of months but never could find what we were looking for. So we went to Plan B. Audrey could have our hand-me-down car and I would get the new one : )

Audrey's Birthday - Take 1

Had to open presents before her dad went out of town...

Valentine Party

We were invited to a Valentine's Party by the Bouviers and Freedlands. Boy do they know how to throw a bash! There was plenty of food - meatballs, chips/dip, cocktail wieners, chocolate fountain with angel food cake and fruit plus all the treats each couple brought (Carter, Gonzalez, Spear, Whalen, Adamson, Freedland, Bouvier, Murray, and a neighbor couple).

One of the first games was set up like The Dating Game, where the women were asked to answer some questions and then the men came in and gave what their responses were. And then the men had answered questions and we gave our responses. I cannot remember all the questions, but below are a few of them:

What she wore on our first date - this was easy for the newlywed couple who had only been married for 2 months, but for us that was 23+ years ago! John figured it was jeans and a blouse since we had gone to Kelly's at the State Line to dance. Wow he had a good memory! I had actually forgotten that was our first date.

Wife's Favorite dish - my problem here was I did not know my own favorite dish, so just said stroganoff. When John gave his answer (Chicken Osaka) I would have to agree that he did know which was my favorite dish!!

Favorite trip - this was extremely hard. We actually both had the same answer - all of them! We think fondly back on all our trips because we were together. Hawaii, Florida, Bahamas, New England, Disneyland, Utah, Seattle, Portland, etc.

How many pairs of shoes does she have...da-da-dum. Poor guy. I was embarrassed to actually put the real answer, so I under-bid. John gave a closer-to-real answer so we would have gotten a point if I had been more accurate. Check out these bad boys I bought right before Valentine's if you have any idea how much I love shoes!!


Then we had a different question and answer session - questions like who was married on or closest to an official holiday (Day after Thanksgiving for us); who has the closest birth dates (11 days apart for us); who gave the most creative Valentine gift to their spouse (when John had Stephanie Vigil, a local TV anchor, deliver chocolate covered strawberries to me at work); and which couple looks the most alike (we actually got a point on this as others think we look alike).

What a fun party!!

Chocolate Cherry Cake

For the Valentine's party we were invited to, we were to bring our spouses favorite dessert. John always raves about Chocolate Cherry cake when he has at potlucks, so I decided to make this for him.

CHOCOLATE CHERRY CAKE
1 package Triple Chocolate Fudge cake mix
21 ounce can cherry pie filling
1 teaspoon almond extract
4 eggs
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a jelly roll pan. In a bowl combine cake mix, cherry pie filling, almond extract and eggs. Stir until well blended. Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake for 20-30 minutes or until tests done. Cool.

FROSTING
1 cup sugar
5 tablespoons butter
1/3 cup milk
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
In a saucepan, combine sugar, butter and milk. Boil, stirring constantly for 2 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in chocoalte chips until smooth. Immediately pour over partially cooled cake.

Variation: Use a white cake mix, blueberry filling, vanilla extract and add 1/2 tsp of lemon zest to batter. For frosting use white chocolate chips and more lemon zest.