She's In Parties

First up, Happy Birthday to my mum, Sweeney's Nana!! And to the several hundred other members of our extended family who share her birthday with her. It's the same day as Al Capone's birthday, but that's another story ...

Kimberley, the lads and myself went down to see her for a few days this week. The garden looks great - lots of fuschias for the boys to pop, red dahlias for me to covet, and a vege garden that manages to be functional and pretty.

We had lunch at the Curator's House, in the Botanic Gardens. There's a beautiful kitchen garden there, and the bees were keeping busy in amongst it all. Sweeney even picked up his first ever bee sting, which earned him a tea towel filled with ice cubes and full attention from The Italian - one of the waiters - for a bit.

I made a devil's food cake from Kitchen - yes, I travel with it - which was pretty flaming splendid, if I say so myself. Two chocolate sponges, layered with icing made of butter, sugar and a cake of dark chocolate. Then the whole external mass slathered with more of that same icing. The boys carefully positioned chocolate buttons on the dark surface, we plonked on some candles, and we were away.

It was rich enough that none of us ate much. There was a round on the birthday itself, then morning tea the next day, a slab was packed up for some neighbours, and there was still enough to seriously dent anyone's resolve to calorie count. Look at it, it took three people to cut the thing ...