We’ve been discussing James 1:2, “Brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials . . .” And this is Adele’s “joy face” — which she has to show me if she has a bad attitude about something. Works EVERY time!

I like parties to be simple. Especially birthday parties. Generally, I find that children’s birthday parties (especially on pinterest!) are not at all simple — stressful for the parents and they seem to encourage selfishness in the children. So we typically just have a family dinner with maybe one friend. But, since we are relatively new to the neighborhood and hadn’t gotten to know a few of the neighborhood kids’ parents yet, we turned Adele’s birthday party into an excuse to get to know some of her friends’ parents and siblings. We invited the three families of the kids that all play together on our street. I made simple invitations with watercolor paint and dip pen calligraphy (which was no big deal since I only had to do three). We decided to do lunch, so that Kent could cook the pizzas while the sun was still out (and lunch worked out better for our guests, too). I specified “no gifts, please” on the invitations (but, everyone brought gifts anyway).

We didn’t have a theme, organized games, or party favors. The kids had a blast coloring and running around. Everybody had a chance to talk and get to know each other better.

With all three leaves in the table (and just about every chair in the whole house at the table), the birthday tablecloth wasn’t quite long enough =)

I don’t think Eleanor was put down once during the whole party. Everybody was commenting on how easy and happy she was. She even took a nap in sweet Grace’s arms!

My buddy N chillin’ with Everett.

I am so grateful to be living in this house, in this neighborhood. I am so grateful that Adele has so many friends to play with right outside our door.

For drinks, we served hot mulled cider (one gallon was more than enough since we used small punch cups), fizzy water, and plain water.

Kent made the Butter Sponge Cake from Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child (three layers) on Thursday night, then we put the cakes into the freezer. On Friday night before dinner, Mom did the crumb coat with Julia’s buttercream frosting recipe for the outside and a homemade strawberry frosting for the filling (all per Adele’s request). Before bed, I took the cake out and did the second coat of frosting. On Saturday morning after breakfast, I did the lettering and added the sprinkles.

 

And, now for the pizza pictures . . .

Kent made six pizzas for the party. He is constantly optimizing his oven skills =) Right now, it takes him two minutes and twenty seconds to bake one pizza (rotating it halfway through). He assembles the pizzas on the wood peels and removes them from the oven with the metal peels.

 

Kent has two doors for the oven (you can see them on the ground to the left of the oven in the picture below).  The smaller black one is the firing door (used while cooking pizza), which allows the air to flow and keeps the fire going. The larger silver one covers the opening completely — he uses it for baking bread and other things once the coals have been removed. 

Note the coils on the handle. They are magic, people! You really can touch the coils with your bare hands but you have to be super careful not to brush your skin against any part of the door other than the coils because that thing is WICKED HOT!

This was the  most unique pizza of the day – onion, bacon, and egg – and it was delicious!

 

You can follow our pizza oven adventures right HERE.