Celebrating our birthdays

Charles's homemade strawberry shortcake birthday cake

Charles and I are now 14 and 16 years old. We celebrated our birthdays in two different, but fun food-filled ways.

Charles recently had a sleepover birthday party this month. He invited his friends out to Tokyo Seafood Buffet for dinner. Afterwords, Charles and his friends ate strawberry shortcake at our house courtesy of my Grandma, who always makes great cakes for our birthdays. My brother said that Grandma's home-made cake was fantastic, and the best part was that the 3-layer cake was huge! Even in the morning, his friends were still trying to finish off the gargantuan cake.

Grandma's Strawberry Shortcake Cake

Coincidentally, my 14th birthday fell upon the same date as my Cousin Olivia's First Holy Communion. So I decided to celebrate my birthday by going up North to see her First Holy Communion with my family.












After the Communion ceremony, my Cousin's parents held a reception back at their house. I had a blast visiting my New York family and eating great tasting food! Who could ask for anything more?

 Cousin Olivia at her 1st Holy Communion 

 When they brought out the desserts, I thought it was more food to celebrate Olivia's big day. However, to my surprise, they had a whole cassata cake to commemorate my birthday. They all sang me happy birthday too.

A cassata cake is a traditional Sicilian sweet, found in most Italian bakeries, and used in many Italian family celebrations. Cassata cakes have cannoli cream filling and are frosted with a sweet cream and decorated with sliced almonds. 

-Thomas

hoco @@@