Birthday

The end of the year at our house always brings many birthdays. All of the birthdays are within 45 days of each other except for Miriya and Tom who are just one week apart in April. I guess our family is one for clustered birthdays. Anyway, we always have fun activities and cake around for our birthday celebrations. This year, since Miriya works at a bakery, she actually made my birthday cake. It was a red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting. She decorated it and presented it to me. It looked beautiful and tasted even better. I was thrilled. It was the best birthday cake I have ever had, especially since she made it and decorated it herself. The owner of the bakery is sending Miriya to a cake decorating class so that she can help decorate wedding cakes at the store. Miriya is pretty excited about the whole thing.

For my birthday dinner Tom took me out to eat at the Melting Pot. I love that place. It is too expensive to go all the time so once or twice a year for special occasions makes it even better. At first Tom tried to sell me on the idea of taking everyone out to Olive Garden. I explained that was not a good birthday present since running interference between a 4 year old and a 2 year old at a restaurant really isn't that much fun. What I really wanted was a date night. Just Tom and me talking together over fondue without having to take kids out because they are crying or throwing food, and not having to break up fights between the older 2. What a present!

On Saturday we went to a new place in Cincinnati that we had never visited. We just read about it in a book and were intrigued. Early in the 1940s there was a scout leader who took his troop down to the river and began camping out. The scouts decided to build a shelter using the stones from the river. Eventually the shelter turned into a castle that they used for their overnight trips and that the scout leader lived in year round. We went to check it out and found that it was pretty neat. The grounds are big gardens. They are covered with snow now, but will be beautiful in the summer. The castle had a dungeon, a dry moat as well as a big banquet room in the upper floor. We had a lot of fun running around and Taylor made sure to point out all the differences between this castle and the castles in Europe. We pointed out how lucky he was to have seen the castles in Europe. That made him think for a few minutes. You can read about the castle here: http://www.lovelandcastle.com/ It was a great outing and the whole story was very interesting. I think it is amazing that one person and his scouts built this entire structure. That was one dedicated scout leader.