Behold, the Coco-nugget!

When my kids were young and eating their own body weight in chicken nuggets, I always bought the dinosaur shaped ones because not only were they fun, but they were also the cheapest kind when I bought the big bag at Costco. Now that Malia is a teenager, I offered to upgrade to the normal shaped nuggets. But Malia protested vehemently, claiming that the dino nuggets are the best. And so, I continue to buy the dino nuggets because Malia loves them. And I can’t really complain. I’m a middle-aged woman who likes to play with her food, creating edible art. So, who am I to judge her for loving the Jurassic version of lunch?

Several months ago, Malia discovered that you could buy throw pillows shaped like her beloved dino nuggets. As they were reasonably priced and she already knows that some much-coveted concert tickets are the bulk of her birthday present, she asked if they could please be a birthday present. I agreed that they were an affordable gift option and suggested that we go whole hog and have a birthday party with chicken nuggets for the main course and a cake covered in toasted coconut made in the shape of a dino nugget. In my mind, that was a two birds one stone kind of a situation. I could indulge her love of dino nuggets and have an opportunity to create some fun food all at the same time. While she decided the whole big birthday party thing was not tickling her fancy this year, she thought the cake was a great idea and thus, a plan was born.

This evening, we celebrated Malia’s birthday at our monthly Sunday dinner at my parents’ house. In preparation for the event, I baked a lovely coconut cake, cut it to look like a brontosaurus, filled it with raspberry filling, and generously coated it with toasted coconut. And it turned out fantastic! I really did look like Malia’s favorite meaty treat in cake form! I’ve been calling it the coco-nugget since it’s a coconut cake shaped like a chicken nugget, but Malia just calls it Jerry.

Although Malia didn’t want the consumption of Jerry to have the accoutrements of candles and singing, we sang anyway. And unfortunately, Jerry had a very bad day. We started by cutting off his head and by the time we were done, only a small portion of drumstick remained. But Jerry was absolutely delicious. The flavor reminded me of those coconut Zinger snack cakes that I used to love as a kid. Only better!

I’m actually really glad Malia let me create a crazy cake for her birthday. With most of my now grown-up kids living away from home, it has been quite a long time since I’ve had the opportunity to create a fun birthday cake. And it is something I enjoy!

Yet Another Pandemic Birthday

As my boys have gotten older, their birthday celebrations have naturally become more low key. Add to that a worldwide pandemic, and Matthew’s fourteenth birthday was downright mellow. We did the cake and candles thing (or in this case the cookies and candles thing) on Sunday while Daniel was here. Matthew opted to do chocolate chip cookie bars instead of cake, so I created a mountain of cookies so there would be a place for the candles to go. I was looking for something to make our celebration a bit special, so I picked up some sparkler candles. I thought it would be fun. What I didn’t know until after the candles were lit and blown out was the fact that these particular candles also have a tendency to reignite. It had not been my intention to make my asthmatic child blow out the candles a dozen times, but it happened and was actually pretty entertaining. Matthew was a good sport and once he figured out that blowing out the flame was not going to get the job done, he got a bowl of water, blew candles out one at a time, and immediately grabbed the extinguished candle and dropped in into the water.

Today was his actual birthday and we had balloons and doughnuts on hand to celebrate. Kevin also took him to K-1 Speed, an indoor go cart spot, by way of an activity. One of Matthew’s favorite video games is one where he just gets to drive a semi-truck all over. The creators map actual roadways and he really enjoys the driving, so driving for real was a good fit.

A few present highlights-Nathan gave Matthew a Metal Earth semi-truck. Like I said, Matthew really enjoys his driving game. He also really liked the wrapping Kev used for the presents from us. Many of his BYU t-shirts have become muscle shirts in the past year, so he has needed a few new ones. He was excited about the big boy Ironman Lego and the electric razor was a less popular, but highly practical gift.

Matthew has grown up a lot in the past year. This particular age has always held a big growth spurt for my boys, and while Matthew has not gained statuesque heights like Nathan did, he has outgrown his pants three or four times in the past year, and he is now taller than I am. He has also grown up mentally and emotionally. In some ways he has always been more mature than others his age due to the necessity of dealing with his food allergies and his subsequent greater understanding of his own mortality, but there has been a big jump forward this year. All of a sudden, he is no longer a little boy. He is a young man. We have all been faced with some daunting emotional challenges in the past year and Matthew is no exception. But he has leaned on his faith and his family and has been able to withstand the adversities that have come. That’s a valuable skill to have gained. I’m hopeful that as life eventually returns to a more normal state that he’ll remember what he has learned and continue to allow all of us to support him. Matthew is the one of my children that I intuitively understand the least, so having him learn to trust us and talk to us makes a huge difference in our relationship. I’m grateful for his trust and hope our relationship will continue to grow as we all move forward as a family. 

Dorkilicious

Birthday celebrations for my big kids have become pretty low key. Last year Nathan invited a huge crowd and they played improv games. All I had to do was provide food. This year he downsized and took a small group of cronies to an escape room. All I had to do was provide food. Nathan thrives on solving puzzles, enjoys cryptograms and the like, and is good at problem solving so it was a perfect fit for him. The game he chose was Harry Potter themed so his inner nerd was happy too. All the kids had a great time and Nathan says doing the same thing every year (although choosing a different theme) would be fantastic.

In the past year, Nathan has grown comfortable in his own skin. He loves being on the stage crew at school and between that, choir and the musical, he has found a group of friends who have the same interests and with whom he gets along well. He has embraced his inner dork and is completely at ease with his own wacky sense of humor. In my opinion, it’s a good thing. Being at ease with who he is will make the rest of his teenage years (and actually, the rest of his life) just a bit easier. Self-confidence is one of those things that makes the day to day grind seem a bit less harrowing.

Nathan still loves music and playing piano is his “happy place.” He is confident enough in his skills that he is willing to step up and play the organ in sacrament meeting if needed. He enjoys a variety of different music (classical, ragtime, and jazz are just a few of his likes) and discovering his inner Broadway nerd means that I can play all the showtunes I want with no complaints from him. 😊 He is generally quite thoughtful and is (almost) always willing to help in whatever way he can. He has become a bit of an organizing guru as well as his innate OCD has become apparent. He is terribly pleased that he has grown so much that he may, in fact, be taller than Daniel before he is done. Luckily for him, Daniel is in no way threatened by that and takes in all in stride.

Overall, Nathan is a good kid. Especially for a teenager. He’s pleasant to be with and everything. He has come a long way from the toddler who didn’t talk to the teen that won’t stop. But some things remain the same: to quote the illustrious Nathan, “Once a dork, now a dork, always a dork.”