So after staying up till around 3:AM playing Final Fantasy XII, I got up bright and early around the time that Shannon was leaving for work (a little before seven). So to start the day, since I thought I had a bit of time, I decided to play for a little bit longer, (9:AM), I headed upstairs to get ready for the day. After dealing with an issue, I actually got out the door.
I headed down to Hy-vee to pick up a few things for the cake that I was making (For Jen's birthday (a little bit late)). For the cake I made Perfect All American Chocolate Butter Cake frosted with White Chocolate Cream Cheese Buttercream Frosting with a light dusting of Dark chocolate.
I stopped by a coffee shop to pick up a coffee, since I was dragging a little bit and then headed home and started working on the cake. In the background, when I'm cooking (when Shannon's not home), I usually listen to music, but since I've been so behind on the TV that I watched, so I played it and listened to it (don't really need to see Bill Mahr's show), while I was mixing and baking.
It was interesting how it was made. Mixing cocoa with hot water, to release the chocolate flavor and make it stronger.
While the cake was baking, I cleaned up the kitchen, and started the dishwasher. Shannon got home and started to put the finishing touches on the house for having guests over.
I headed out to pick up a few things for the party (Including Templeton Rye, which is made in Iowa...I saw it on the news, and apparently so did a bunch of other people, cause it was out of stock at the Hy-vee (when I went earlier) the Hy-vee drug, but it I was able to get a bottle at Ingersoll Wine and Spirits, one of the last 3). While I was over there, I decided to go to IngerDahls to get some ground lamb to make meatloaf. They were out, which was upsetting, but I got some pork and ground chuck to make it instead, along with some ice cream for cake (one of the kinds of Breyers's that I checked has corn syrup in it, which is not the same as High Fructose Corn Syrup, but still). On my way out Shannon called and said that Renee had called and told her that there were Kitchen Aid Mixers on sale at K's Merchandise. And since K's is going out of business, they were selling it at 25% off.
So I headed home, we put the groceries away, and headed out to K's to check it out. It was very crowded. We found them (they only had black and white, in the kind I wanted), and we looked, we talked, we wandered, and then we decided that this, and the Ice Cream Attachment would be our Christmas present to ourselves. We were in a debate what were were going to do for Christmas, and it came out that Shannon wanted to try to be able to get me this anyways. So we did get it. Nice big one, that'll last us forever. With 100$ off, it made it quite the bargain. We looked around a bit more, saw some rugs, saw that they were hand made, started looking and even at 75% off, they were too expensive (75% off of $10,000, is still just to much). Shannon ended up getting a Christmas wreath. and we headed out. So between the mixer, the ice cream attachment, and the wreath, it came out to be less then the mixer would've been.
We headed back, had a few more finishing touches and I made the frosting. Frosted the cake (which I am getting halfway decent at, though I still have a long way to go) and then I dusted the cake with dark chocolate from Stam with the microplane grater that we had bought with some of the gift cards we had gotten for the wedding. I got done with a mere 25 minutes to spare before our party was going to start.
Game night went pretty well. Adam, Tiff and baby Savannah, Chris and Holly, Jen, Will, Courtie, Dave, and James. I played some Cosmic Encounter and some Dread Pirate with Will, Chris and Adam, While Shannon was over in the other room with the others playing Scene It and games of that type.
Around 1:AM, after only getting 4 hours at most of sleep, I started to get sleepy, so I headed upstairs to crash. Shannon finished up the game they were playing, and then headed upstairs.
So the cake...it was a little dryer then I like, but it sort of melted in your mouth. The frosting was very good. A combination of butter, cream cheese and Green and Black White Chocolate and a bit of lemon juice. Yummy.
Jen end up taking what was left of her cake home, in the handy dandy cake carrier.
Good long day, good cake, and lots of fun.