evienne's 2nd birthday tea party

for evienne's second birthday we ended up having a simple family tea party, which turned out to be the best thing, and i think we might have enjoyed it the most of any party we've ever had. or at least i did, and in no small part i credit it to the cake that i made — mimi thorisson's salted butter chocolate cake from her french country cooking cookbook. i made a few adjustments, most notably substituting gluten-free flour, leaving out a third of the called-for sugar and frosting it with a buttercream frosting. it was perfection. or near enough to leave me in raptures about it, anyways. i always feel that the important part of celebrations is the cake, and i was thrilled to finally produce a cake that lived up to my expectations. i'm not sure why, but most birthday cakes I've made have only been ho hum and not worth duplicating. this cake, though, made all my dreams come true.

tea parties are some of my absolute favorite favorite favorite things in the whole world, and right now the book that evienne most frequently requests is little bear's friend, in which there is a tea party. so of course, i started having dreams of a tea party for evienne's birthday and then trying to make the logistics of a tea party for a two-year-old and her equally small friends work with my vision for it which was getting complicated. so when we originally planned to have friends over, i scrapped the idea of a tea party and just knew there would be cake. at the last minute, basically the day of, when i realized it was just going to be us, i decided to throw together a tea party for her. it was super simple and contained all her favorite things: cake, berries, cheese, crackers, popcorn, cashews and drinking/eating from adult-sized dishes, flowers, and a hat (flower crown) to wear. and the birthday song, which she also regularly requests i sing, usually directed towards everyone in her acquaintance, no matter that they are not actually there to hear it. we forgot her balloons and did nothing except eat and eat some more and open a present for her dolly, named lucy after the doll in the little bear's friend book. she blew out candles (with some help) and ate her cake and was so happy, dancing in her chair. it could not have been more perfect, and even though i am sad to think of my little girl growing up so fast, i was so happy to see her so happy and to celebrate her wonderful birth. this is so sappy, but everything about this celebration made me so happy. probably because this little girl makes me so happy.

happy birthday evienne! i love you.