Layered Rainbow Birthday Cake

One of the advantages of watching Masterchef is that Jack will occasionally see a recipe that he wants to have a go at making. One of the disadvantages is that they are usually Adriano Zumbo creations that involve acetate and titanium dioxide and a degree in chemical engineering. His recipes have reduced grown men to tears. Level of difficulty? Off the charts.

So you probably heard my heart thud into the pit of my stomach when I asked Jack what kind of birthday cake he wanted this year and he replied "Liliana from Masterchef's Rainbow Cake."

Now I haven't been watching Masterchef religiously this year so I had no idea what cake he was referring to and had to look it up online. You can imagine how utterly thrilled I was to discover that Liliana was eliminated from the show for making this Rainbow Cake because it was TOO SIMPLE for Masterchef. "Not a Masterchef dish" said the judges. Music to my ears.

So here you go. Jack's birthday cake, aka Liliana's Rainbow Cake, aka The Elimination Cake!

You can find Liliana's recipe here, however when I read that it took 6 hours to make, I decided to go to my own fall-back cake recipe - a mix-and-melt cake batter that has been handed down to all the women in my family from my great-grandmother. Each quantity makes 2 cakes so the whole thing only took me 2.5 hours, including cooling time and decorating.

 

Grandma Dillon's Mix-n-Melt Cake

(You will need 2 quantities to make 4 cakes)

2 ¼ cups SR flour
1 ½ cups castor sugar
2 eggs
1 cup milk 

1 teaspn vanilla extract

125g butter, melted

Colours - blue, green (mix blue and yellow), red, orange (mix red and yellow)

Mix all ingredients and beat well. Divide evenly into two bowls and add enough colouring to make the colour really vibrant. Add a little more. Go on.

Radioactive Green & Sizzling Hot Pink ready to go in the oven

Blue and orange seem positively sedate compared to red and green!

Spoon mixtures into 2 tins lined with baking paper and cook in oven at 180C for approx 25 mins. Skewer should come out clean when cooked.

 

Butter Frosting

500g butter

6 cups icing sugar

1/2 cup milk

2 tspn vanilla extract

Beat all ingredients well until thick.

When cakes are cooled, use a long, sharp bread knife to slice the rounded top from each cake so that the top of the cakes is now flat. (Be prepared to be dazzled by the vibrant colour of your cake inside!) This will make layering easier and your cake is less likely to look like the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

Sandwich each cake layer between slatherings of butter frosting, then once the cake is assembled, use a spatula to smooth frosting onto the top and sides of the cake until it is completely covered. 

In a bowl, mix up any kind of sweets you like to decorate the sides. We used Nerds and sprinkles, but you could include anything you find in the cake decorating department of the supermarket! Mini M&Ms could work well too. We literally grabbed handfuls and sort of pressed them into the side of the cake. I won't lie, it was messy but fun! Instead of piping frosting onto the top of the cake, we used chocolate covered marshmallows.

The cake was a huge hit with the kids at Jack's party. There was a big "ooh-aah" factor when it came out. But it is sweeeeet!! My tooth fillings rattled as I raised a spoonful of cake to my lips.

Enjoy!

A big knife for a big cake!

Ten

Warning: This is a completely indulgent, unapologetic love-a-thon for my son Jack, whose recent tenth birthday got me quite pathetically mushy and sentimental.

 My darling Jack

In the words of every parent in the history of the universe "I can't believe you're ten! Where has that time gone?"

I'm writing this letter to you here on my blog because as I've taught you, if it's on the internet, it's out there forever and I want you always to be able to tap into your ten year old Jack.

I think you'll look back and like him. You should. He's amazing.

There are so many things that make you so very 'you' and I'm not just talking about those gigantic, swimming pool blue eyes, or that adorable smattering of freckles on your nose, or the way you insert the word 'actually' into many of your sentences.

You love nothing more than to run around in bare feet and I'm fairly sure that if you were the Prime Minister, you would ban shoes altogether (but that would make a lot of women very unhappy and, trust me, you don't want to get on the wrong side of women. Especially shoe women. Life lesson). We went to the mall last week and you got out of the car in bare feet, accidentally-on-purpose 'forgetting' to bring your thongs, which are, by the way, considered by you to be the only acceptable form of footwear year round. It wouldn't surprise me if you turn up to your own wedding in bare feet. And that's okay, just as long as you've ditched The Shorts by the then. You know what I mean by The Shorts don't you? The khaki cargo shorts with the elastic waist that you wear on permanent rotation now have holes in the bum but I still can't get you out of them. You're loyal like that.

Every now and then, more frequently these days, I get a glimpse of the man you will become, mostly when I watch how you interact with your two year old sister - gentle, kind, a strong sense of justice, an ability to find silly in the serious when needed. You can jolly Francesca out of a whingy mood with a wrestle on our bed, or a game of chasey where you always let her catch you (after awhile anyway!) It does make me laugh, though, how you roll your eyes when Cesca talks about Thomas or the Wiggles, like you can't believe you ever went out with them!

You are beginning to open up to the world outside your own sphere - questioning, considering, speculating, reasoning. You watch for other people's reactions and moderate your own responses. It's not just you and teddy anymore kid. In other words, you are maturing and it swells my heart to watch.

I'm especially proud of the way you've handled the transition to your new school, in particular how easily you've made new friends, yet maintained the authentic friendships from your old school. I think the reason you've made such great new friends is that you know from experience how important it is to be kind, inclusive, non-competitive and giving of yourself. The difference in you is amazing. You are more confident, eager to learn and willing to stand up for yourself. You also look great in yellow! How cool that you get to wear your favourite colour to school every day.

Despite your rapidly growing maturity, you are still very much a kid. You love to run the wrong way up escalators when the coast is clear, wrestle with Dad on the king size bed, perform arm-fart concerts in the bath and conduct fantastical mock battles between Autobots and Decepticons. You are a champion lego builder and an excellent hand-baller and you still can't eat an ice-cream without getting a chocolate moustache. And beard. At least ice cream is one of the foods you will eat. Ahhhh Jack, let's not talk about food hey? Let's just say I hope you take after your brother Ryan who, for awhile there would only eat meat and bread, preferably meat inside bread. Now he eats everything on God's green earth, even salad. Think of it. SALAD!! You roll your eyes now about the Wiggles. One day I hope you will roll your eyes remembering your infatuation with white processed foods, while tucking into a quinoa, beetroot and goats cheese salad.

You have begrudgingly accepted that Monday to Thursday is screen free time and when you forget that you don't like that particular house rule, you actually enjoy the other things you find to do. I find you curled up in a corner with a book, practicing your favourite piano pieces, playing handball against a wall, skating in the cul de sac with your mates, or sitting quietly in your bedroom recreating lego spaceships into new and fanciful masterpieces.

You don't need much help with your homework these days, and when the teacher tells you to write interesting sentences, you really do take that on board big time. Here are some examples of your recent sentences:

On Monday I shot a blazing, hot arrow into the sky and accidentally knocked a poor crane to the ground. 

The energetic heifer was jumping up and down and magically started flying and got stuck in a tree. 

The old man earned a pittance for his amazingly, massive job. (Damn capitalists!) 

The young, intelligent boy pasteurised the milk to get the dreadful germs out. 

I get the feeling you've been learning all about adjectives in class this term. I must say I'm very pleased there is a young, intelligent boy in charge of the milk. I must also remember not to walk under trees that have magical, flying, energetic heifers in them!

You have long legs and lanky arms that seemed to have stretched overnight (oh my chubby-faced, roly-poly baby boy - where did you go?) but which can still curl up neatly in order to fit on mum's lap which, thankfully, you still like to do every day.

You smell a bit more like a sweaty boy now. And suspiciously like chocolate milk a lot of the time.

You love sport. Any sport, but rugby union, rugby league, soccer and AFL are your favourites. You get in there and give every sport you play 100%. Losing never seems to bother you or many of your mates. You just love the game, the tackling, the fun of it all. And the sausage sandwiches slathered in tomato sauce of course.

You have encyclopaedic knowledge about all things Minecraft and I am blown away when I watch you journey through the incredible worlds you've created. You are a true digital native, navigating the online world in a way that is second nature to your generation. I will scramble to keep up with you, but keep up I must. The internet is a big, scary universe and it's my job to protect you and remind you of what is real and good, that the internet can distort reality and make bad things seem normal. I love that we can talk about that stuff now and I hope we always will.

Most of all I feel incredibly lucky that I get to come along for the ride (and I promise not to embarrass you too much - no more Abba songs!)

All my love always & forever

Mum xoxo

PS. I've made a little video for you . . .

Bowling & Babycinos

I'm indulging in a bit of "alliterative title poaching" from my friend Mauz, whose blog Mauz & Sparky is hilarious and clever in the extreme (hers is one of those wine-worthy blogs - you know, the ones where you pour yourself a cheeky chardonnay, settle in for a good read and end up snorting said chardonnay through nostrils as you guffaw through each post). Mauz loves a bit of alliteration as her most recent post Bridges, Brides & Bucket Lists will attest. I daresay she is also partial to the occasional rhyming couplet (Manbags, Gypsy's Rags & Wet Stags anyone?)

Anyhoo, don't go visiting Mauz just yet. I've got stuff to tell you!

As I mentioned in my last post, we decided to partake of a little Barraclough-style therapy and head up the coast for a week with our two youngest kids. It's been quite a year, with the death of my beloved mother in law in March being the lowest point, and some other issues that we will just put under the heading of "What Doesn't Kill You Makes You Stronger (and Drunker)".

We also discovered that there is a juvenile equivalent to the Fat, Forty & Fired mid-life crisis that some men go through. It's called Nine, Nervous & Not Quite Right and our Jack was the poster boy. But instead of solving it by getting him a younger wife and a Ferrari, we loaded up the car with fishing gear, surfboards and Minties and went to Crescent Head.

Apparently, this can be a tough time for boys. Who knew? But doing a bit of reading and talking to other mums of nine year old boys, there are some common themes. Transitioning into middle primary school, where the workload is ramped up, mixed with a little hormonal action and a whole lot of the chest-beating alpha male stuff that goes along with it left our fella with some very real physical symptoms that, after numerous trips to the doctor and various tests, can now be attributed to anxiety. Because when we took him out of school and up the coast, the symptoms - crippling stomach cramps and a persistent vocal tic (a sort of grunting hum littering his speech) that had both plagued him for six months - disappeared in 24 hours.

I'm now wondering if my crippling case of procrastination on 'work' days could potentially be solved by a trip to Florence. I'm thinking YES.

But I digress.

Crescent Head is one of those tiny coastal hamlets somewhere on the Australian coast, boasting a pub, a club, a butcher, a baker but, as far as I know, no candlestick makers. You can, however, get a decent Thai meal at the local motel and the chemist does a good line in buckets, spades and other colourful sand moving equipment. You can play tennis or barefoot bowls, and there's a fab little 6 hole golf course on the headland that will have you teeing off the edge of a crevasse while the rolling swell of the Pacific belts into the hard slate walls of the rocky inlet way below. Many a golf ball has been sacrificed to the briny below that crevasse and I can imagine whole cities built of bleached white golf balls by the sea creatures that live there.

The main attraction, however, is the beach. It has, so they tell me, a totally bodacious surf break, full of bangin' bad ass barrels and rad right-handers that go on forever. Man.

(Wow, see that? I totally channeled a Californian Rastafarian just then)

But what I really love about the beach is the lagoon. With its little pools and sandy edges, it's toddler heaven and protected by the fiercer easterlies. Then when the tide turns and the water rushes in from the ocean, everyone jumps into the middle of the swelling lagoon to be swept upstream to the upper reaches of Killick Creek - a great spot to hang out as the sun goes down and throw a line into the middle of a school of bream. We did that and Jack caught the first fish. I hunt! I am male! Hear me roar!

As far as your eye can see to the north, it's just miles of wild, uninterrupted beachscape - broad blonde sand dunes and scrubby trees against a backdrop of low-rise mountains. Classic Aussie coast.

We spent hours on the beach every day, ate flaky fresh vanilla slices at the bakery, drank G&Ts on the barefoot bowling green and dined out most nights. Nearly every day we all ended up in the spa together with Francesca playing baristas, making us 'chinos' at the tap by jooshing the 'milk' in a plastic jug. (Does our daughter spend too much time in cafes? Don't be silly. But while the other kids are making cups of tea, she does a fairly mean double macchiato. Just saying.)

John and I tag teamed on kid duty so we could get some time alone; he went for surfs and massages, I ran down the golf greens, did yoga every day and read three novels.

But the best thing of all was that Jack, our gorgeous blue eyed boy, found his mojo and we couldn't have asked for more.

Embarrassing Side Note:
As the only photographer on the holiday, there is only one picture of me. Somehow, and certainly not on purpose, I've managed to give my unflatteringly shaped shadow a fancy little bikini wax. That's what you get for trying to be arty!

Telling it like it is . . .

So this morning Jack jumps into bed with us at the unusually late hour of 6.15am and proceeds to wiggle his way down to the bump to have a word with the baby.

Sometimes this involves singing, sometimes just a hello and a kiss, sometimes a more detailed discussion about the minutiae of our daily life. Not only will this baby have some idea of how life works in the Barraclough household and what it can expect upon exit, it will also have an appreciation for the entire back catalogue of Michael Jackson.

This morning, however, Jack only had one piece of vital news to impart to the baby, which wriggled around in my belly when it heard Jack's voice, eager to soak up today's pearl of wisdom.

In a very serious voice, he said "Did you know you will be coming out of mummy's big vagina? When it gets even bigger, that's when you come out."

Good to know.