Happy Birthday (Round #2)...

or Bon Anniversaire, if you prefer

Ecouter bien:
Connor a quatorze ans aujourd'hui. Zut! Oh-la-la!
Translation: "Listen Up: Connor turned 14 today. Holy Cow!"

As most of you know, Connor leads a pretty charmed life and his birthday was no exception, as he got to be out of class all day for a French field trip! La mere (the mother, i.e. moi) was able to accompany his class to Tersiguel's, which is definitely not some dusty old museum, but a 4-star French restaurant nestled in a historic home in Ellicott City.
Upon arrival, students were seated in a lovely dining room surrounded by French artwork and served appetizers of pate, vegetables, cheese and crusty French bread on fine china.

A salad of microgreens grown in the chef's family garden followed and set the stage for the entree of beef bourguignon or coq au vin with pommes frites. Then, Chef Fernand surprised Connor by carrying out a gorgeous mousse au chocolat with a lit candle and led the class in singing Bon Anniversaire! The Chef spent another hour demonstrating how to make traditional crepe de suzette flambe (yep, that means fire!) and answering questions about his life in Brittany.
As field trips on your birthday go, this was definitely magnifique! But, then again, Connor is an all-American kid and it was time to head home and "Play Ball!"

So much for refinement and culture, let's get dirty, boys! After practice it was time for more fine dining at Chez Joyce. Not quite. It sort of gave me a complex going home and trying to cook after watching Chef Fernand, but teenage boys gotta eat, right? Connor requested his fave shrimp scampi pasta for his birthday dinner and, thankfully, I can handle that. He also asked for black forest cake, and after my recent success with fondant on Owen's cake, I got a little "heady" and tried to top the black forest cake with a baseball cap cake.

Kinda worked. What d'ya think? The good news for me is that my boys are soft critics and thought it was pretty awesome. Not nearly as AWESOME as Connor himself though.

Happy Birthday Big Brother!
Je T'aime

Happy Birthday... You Big Nerd!

After the evening festivities were over, Owen still had some serious work left to do on his science fair project... like ALL the actual experimenting and the ENTIRE tri-fold poster. Yes, he had been given two months to do it, but Owen is not the kind of guy to stress out and work TOO much in advance, even if it was due the day after his birthday. Why not make the most of his big day by staying up late shooting water bottle rockets with Dad and Reilly, messing around on powerpoint with Connor and Graeme, and then glueing and pasting his display board with Mom... until 2 am! Yes, we were ALL beginning to, literally, regret the day he was born. :) All except Pierce who will take any excuse to stay up til midnight and run with it...
Here are photos of the birthday boy hard at work... some tests actually had to be conducted at 5:30 am the following morning...


Owen learned a lot, was proud of himself and did good work.

Two afternoons later, he came bounding up the driveway after school, with a medal flapping around his neck, yelling, "Look Mom! I did it Connor-style: 1st place in one night!"

That must have been what he wished for when the candles were glowing! Great job!

Happy Birthday! (Round #1)

Owen had a great day celebrating his 10th birthday. He had school (ho hum), a lacrosse game (all right!), special request dinner (steak on the grill, baked potatoes and strawberries), birthday cake (Boston Cream with Mom's first foray into the world of fondant to make it uniquely OJO) and presents (cash for the first time). Owen loved it all and says he does, in fact, feel older now. :) I guess it was a pretty big DECADE!

Owen scored a goal ...

...and saved a few on his birthday! Way to go!
Check out the glow!
Nothing tops Under Armor... again!

Happy Birthday
to the most generous,
cool,
laid back,
warm-blooded,
ready-to-play dude in the house!