Weekend Celebration

Over the weekend, we went to visit our friends, Jennifer and Jason. Their daughter, Veronica, will be turning 2 yrs old on the 29th. We will not be able to attend her birthday party because we have a unexpected trip out of town this Labor Day weekend. So, we celebrated her birthday early. That way, we could enjoy seeing her opening her presents.It was a beautiful day in New York City, so we took a walk and went to their nearby park. This was Melody's first time on a swing.She has learned to sit up on her own recently, so we figured we would give the swing a try. She was a bit scared because you can see her right arm gripping the seat.But she really enjoyed it! She was cracking up laughing when we would swing her.Veronica showing us how the big girls do it.I baked her a cake, a Chocolate Strawberry Cake with Fudge Frosting. Her parents didn't know how she learned to blow out a candle, but she started making the blowing motions as soon as I lit the candle. They think she learned it from those children's dvds that she watches. Those dvd's are very educational these days.The cake was so yummy! It was moist even though it had no eggs in it. The moistness comes from the buttermilk. Originally, the recipe is called One-Bowl Buttermilk Chocolate Cupcakes. I doubled the recipe and spread the batter into two 8 inch cake pans and baked them for 35 min. In the middle, I put strawberry preserves and diced up some fresh strawberries. The Fudge Frosting came from the book, Chocolate Holidays. The frosting was quick and easy. It was very easy to use because when it's warm, you can use it like a ganache and pour it. Or you can wait until it cools for it to become a frosting consistency.