Happy Mr.Blab Day! Hooray!

When I met him, I didnt know we will end up where we are, it was not love of first sight. It was better – I loved him the first moment I got to know him. The hopeless romantics of you might snicker at my preference, but the reason I say its better is because it was not based on primal urges, which often have no concern for our emotional well being. My love for Mr.Blab was based on him as a person – a loving, caring, gentle man with whom I can spend hours laughing and chatting late into the night.

More than 12 years later, I was looking forward to celebrating his special day with him, yet again.

I wanted to throw him a party, but the man is a homebody and it would have been hard to find enough close friends to do it. I thought it would be a bit funny with all of my friends, so I dropped the idea.

He didnt want anything as a present, surprise, surprise; and this year we are not spending money on things like that anyway, so that was out.

And so the kids and I had to come up with something more Mr.Blabby, more personal, more us.

So in the morning, we left him to sleep in and while Miss Fab cooked up pikelets (small pancakes), I tidied up the place, cleaned up his desk. Little B, collected flowers from the garden and after awhile we were ready to wake him up. One of his favorite CDs played in the background and we went in to welcome him to his birthday.

Special breakfasts seem to be a routine around here.

We love to do one at every possible opportunity.

He seemed happy and after breakfast received his handmade gifts from the kids. Ice cream made out of cotton balls? Yeah, just what I need, thanks darling ;)

We forbid any kind of working for the day. No working, we said. None at all.

He followed our instructions well.

Smart man.

The rest of the morning went into playing games and leisurely activities. Me? I washed the dishes, cleaned up some more, prepared the meat for lunch, stripped the bed and loaded washing. Then ran out of the door to go grab the fish I needed for dinner. It had to be fresh.

An hour later I was back and ready to prep the next meal for the day. When asked what he wanted to eat on his birthday, Mr.Blab answered: sushi….tacos…sushi or tacos!

I found a lovely sounding recipe for beef tacos and hoped it will be good. On a sweaty summer day, this was the best lunch, made even better by the chilled beer with a lime floating on top.

Mmmm…

The meat?

It was delicious.  But you cant have any kind of Mexican meal without a bunch of salsas and guacamole.

I made a tomato, and an onion and coriander salsa.

If Mr.Blabs mmm and yumming was just a lie not to hurt my feelings, mine were genuine. I truly enjoyed this.

I love salsas.

More dishes for me. Then I joined in the games fun and managed to grab a quick coffee and a rest. Its not easy to be a proper old-fashioned house slave housewife, people. I dont know how women did it. Its one thing to chose to do this for a day,but day in and day out would be exhausting.

For afternoon treat I whipped up our favorite ice-chocolate. There was talk for a walk to the cafe to grab one, but the heat out there was not inviting and Mr.Blab voted for a home brew.

The kids were ecstatic.

So ecstatic,

that they let no liquid go to waste

no matter where it went.

A certain girl may have tried to trick a little boy into giving her more than her fair share, but he caught up to her game and fought her til there was nothing left.

Nowhere.

More clean up, sheets flapping on the clothesline outside and waiting to be put on the bed.

After some more playing, I get ready for dinner. You may have guessed it, but dinner was sushi. Mr.Blab prefers tuna, but I could not find sashimi grade of the fish, so I ended up getting salmon, which is my favorite and his close second choice.

And this is where my well planned day went a bit WACKO. My sushi rice is always temperamental. I dont know if its because I dont have a rice cooker, or I just suck at this, but the fact of the matter is that most times I have trouble with it.

So I made a batch – it was a bit underdone.

So I made another – it was overdone.

I abandoned perfection and just made due with what I have.

The underdone batch went in the sushi and the overdone one went in the bowls.

A bunch of sashimi, octopus salad, sesame seaweed salad, rolls, veggies and it was all done.

We love sushi.

All of us.

Music playing in the background, laughter over the crappy rice and munching on raw fish, the dinner ended up beautifully. The bad news is that the girls are now official sashimi lovers – we are not sure we can afford four of us in the family.

More clean-up, and this one was brutal. Sushi rice is not only temperamental, it sticks like glue to every surface it touches. Glue!

Then Mr.Blab was told to stay away and we set up the cake.

He had asked for a chocolate one with lots of frosting.

THE cake.

This cake took me two days and over 5 hours to make, but that is the subject of an entire post, which I hope to write soon.

It may not look it, but this is one fancy cake. Adriano Zumba’s chocolate mousse cake.

When the knife went in, my knees trembled. I may have fainted a bit in my mind.

The layers from the bottom are as follows: cinnamon sable (biscuit) , chocolate mousse, jaconde, two textured caramel apples, mousse, jaconde, salted caramel, all over the top and sides  its blackberry chocolate mousse.

Phew! It survived and it tasted good.

After the kids were in bed, we splashed in the living room and watched a movie, stopping for a cake break.

Later, the birthday boy had a shower and he rested his now older body on the freshly sun-kissed crispy sheets I had prepared for him. The details are important, they make the whole.

Happy Birthday, old man. I hope my whole made the day as good as I wanted it to be for you.

The housewife of your dreams ;)