Beating the Winter Blues With Cake

I'm a firm believer in the power of cake. Call it emotional eating, call it feeding the gray, cold weather...call it whatever you like but I assure you it gives you a little "rush" like nothing else can. Now I don't necessarily advocate making a cake without a solid reason...although I would be happy to provide a solid list of "good reasons" to make a cake...I suggest finding a person you love (and even just like alot) and celebrating their birthday. If you have the good fortune of coming from a large family and then being smart enough to marry into a big family, you have lots of birthdays to choose from. We can pretty much find a birthday to celebrate any month of the year, any day of the month. I love it. And it doesn't hurt that these are people who I love celebrating...people I love need big cakes. And now this paragraph has come full circle.
In the last week, we have had the amazing good fortune of celebrating two wonderful people. First, my father-in-law who technically doesn't have a birthday every year. He was born on leap year...if you celebrate on February 28th, you are a day early. But if you celebrate March 1st, you are a day late. So we just pick a day and eat cake...and tell him how much we love and appreciate him. He is a man/father/grandfather who deserves lots of celebrating. Our family has the good fortune of living exactly 3.2 miles from him...and we would be lost without his amazing talents, abilities, and generous service. Thank you Grandpa!


Grandpa being silly.

Grandpa being scary.

Grandpa finally blowing out the candles before the house burns down...
(Refer to coconut birthday cake story...)

The next birthday belonged to my fabulous sister-in-law. My brother showed his finest smarts in choosing this amazing woman to marry. She has blessed our family with grace, elegance, wisdom, humor, and so many talents. Her culinary skills are expert. Her ability to host a party is exquisite. Her ability to speak French is perfect. She is all I hope to be when I grow up...I consider it a huge blessing to call her "sister"...and to live 20 minutes away.

How I love a party with these people...Happy Birthday wonderful ML!

Now it must be said that if you are going to spend much time eating lots of cake, it needs to be somewhat balanced with a little moving. We took care of that on Saturday with our annual cross country skiing trip! This year we headed up to Soldier Hollow in Midway, UT for a day of brilliant blue skies, warm spring weather, and smooth snow gliding. It was perfect!

OK, so "smooth" gliding may be a tiny bit of an exaggeration but we fall with much grace and drama...I feel quite confident in saying my children get all their drama from their father...OK, so that is an exaggeration as well. The drama they get from their mother. No question. The cool, level headed, calm they get from their father. It really would only take 5 minutes in our house to figure that out...but back to the skiing.

I am amazed at how effortlessly my children strap on their skiis and head out. No fear. No hesitation. And then Chris and I spend the rest of the day trying to keep up with them. Young legs go much faster than "old" legs who eat too much cake.

She has the shortest legs but the longest endurance. This little girl cross country skiied for 2 hours before giving any indication that she was getting tired! She is a natural.

Don't we look so hip and "Utah"? We really do love it. I love that we have a "winter" activity that the whole family loves doing. Next year we may venture to the actual mountains and see if our enthusiasm is as big for the "downhill" part of skiing.

This is how you get the 6 year old back to the lodge when you have pushed her too far....

I needed the big dose of vitamin D and family time. It truly did my soul good.

So here is hoping that you have lots of people you love around you, lots of reasons (made up or real) to eat cake, and a warm day to go outside, lift your face to the sun, and feel grateful!