Ignoring and Cakes

I have discovered that there are two ways that I like celebrating my birthday.

One way is to ignore it. I did this last year. I like ignoring it, not because I don't like getting older, I actually love getting older, but because there is a slightly mischievous feeling to walking around knowing that it is a special day, and being one of the only ones to know it. I imagine it is what a celebrity feels when they are successfully incognito. 'That cashier has no idea that they just interacted with a birthday-girl!'.

The other way I that I like to celebrate my birthday is to make a ton of desserts and invite anyone/everyone over to have a piece of cake and hang out.

This year, I did both.

My actual birthday was a fairly delightfully normal day. I got paper work done, answered emails, ran some errands, and even helped with a remodel project in the backyard!

It was made quite a bit special though when my dad made sushi for me!

My time in Tulsa has been very brief. So, knowing that I wouldn't get to see as many people as I wanted, I made a ton of desserts and opened my parents' house for people to drop in and say hello.

I love turning all of this:

Into this:

It was such a blessing having so many people drop in to say hello and catch up briefly before I head back overseas. I was especially touched by some friends who dropped in from out of town! I was a bit distracted once guests started showing up, so I don't have pictures of the festivities. These pastry-full pictures will simply have to suffice.

An Unpostponed Birthday

Last year I postponed my birthday by a week due to a work related trip (you can read about that here: How to Celebrate a Postponed Birthday).

This year I got to celebrate my birthday on the day itself, and by baking a bunch of cakes and pies for several of the ex-pats in Musoma. I had a truly enjoyable and blessed time making 5 different delectable desserts. It took 2 full days of work and then a few hours in the morning to put it all together, but it was absolutely worth it!

So, on the menu was (clockwise from the latticed pie): Apple Pie, gluten-free chocolate cupcakes with mint icing, passion fruit upside-down cake, and a chocolate layer cake with raspberry marshmallow middle and raspberry marshmallow icing. Not pictured is the mango cheesecake (my third attempt at cheesecake here and by far the most successful)!

One of the fun things about making all of these desserts was cooking from scratch, including the marshmallows! I really loved the creativity it took and the problem solving that had to happen along the way to make all of them turn out. As I said above, absolutely worth it.

Especially because it seemed that everyone who came enjoyed themselves and enjoyed the cakes and pies!

Oh, a fun gift that my mom sent me was this nifty zen garden trowel. I've never felt more calm.

UPDATE!!! I have been informed that this is, in fact, an extendable backscratcher...I guess you never can tell.

How to celebrate a postponed birthday

I finally celebrated turning 30 this past weekend. If you didn't already know I postponed my birthday by a week so that I could celebrate with some close friends.

So, how does one go about celebrating a postponed decade changing birthday?

Hm, this way:

Have coffee with a good friend (sadly, no picture of this part of the process).

Make dinner for some friends.
We had vegetable stir-fry with peanut sauce...delicious.

Also, make a weird coffee drink that you've never tried before for those friends.
It is called "European Coffee" and includes whipped egg whites. That is not whipped cream on top...

Have 'Happy Birthday' candles on top of a cake. Thanks Mom and Dad for the candles!!!

Ah yes, the picture of some of the friends that came over for dinner.

Have your housemate make yogurt and strain it as a substitute for cream cheese. That process has to be planned out because it can take up to a week to get enough. This is serious from scratch baking.
Then make a delicious mango cheesecake.

See a tree like this, hugging a rock, reaching desperately for more sun.

Enjoy a beautiful hike through some Tanzanian countryside and pick a hilltop to try and reach.

I will say it was kind of odd having a week where I was no longer in my 20s, but not quite 30. I would say postponing your birthday is a fun activity if you want to mix it up a bit, but shouldn't be a regular occurence.

I'm 30...sort of

This past Friday I turned 30. I have been looking forward to turning 30 this whole year and it finally has happened!!!

Well...actually I am writing this post the Saturday before I turn 30. It will go live after my birthday, but for now (at the time of writing) I am 29.

Ok, why am I writing this so early?

Because I spent my birthday on the largest island in the largest lake in Africa: Kerewe.

This is no island-get-away vacation. No leis greeted me as I disembarked from the ferry.

I've been working with a team of surveyors. We are looking at incorporating the Kara and Kerewe language communities into our translation work at the office, but before we can do that we have to have an official survey of these languages and then report back regarding our findings. So, I am part of a team of 4 who are spending 9 days on the Kara and Kerewe islands surveying these languages.

I don't know if I will have internet access while I am out there, but wanted to be faithful to posting a blog on Monday. So, if you sent me a birthday message and didn't hear back from me, don't worry, I haven't seen the message yet. Hopefully, I'll be able to respond later this week.

Officially, I postponed my birthday to the 26th of this month (check facebook, you'll see), so if you didn't send me message, you still have a few days ;).