The Triple Crown

'The Triple Crown' as my dad refers to it, has become a family holiday. Traditionally our family and my parents get together to celebrate the birthdays of my mom, Annabelle and I. We three share a birthday and it has made celebrating really fun. This year we got together in Colorado.

Traditionally we have cheesecake, which is my all time favorite favorite. My mom enjoys trying out different recipes. Which has worked out every year with the exception of my 7th or 8th grade year when she tried a recipe with gelatin in it. I had some friends from school over and my mom began to serve the cake. By the time we all had a piece in our hands and she headed back into the kitchen the cake reached room temperature and began to melt, leaving little clumps of gelatin that looked like boogers as the only solid on the plate. Upon reaching the kitchen to eat her own piece of cake my mom noticed the mishap and ran back into the party. My friends were sitting there politely trying to scoop up the delicious tasting mess with their forks. They insisted that the cake tasted great but we have laughed about that cake ever since.

Last year I went with a store bought cake as I was hosting the triple crown. I had bought a chocolate cheesecake from this particular store before and it was so delicious that I was sure that the fact that it was store bought could easily be overlooked. When I went to the store to buy one however, they did not have the chocolate version. I bought a plain and raspberry cheesecake instead. Of course they tasted like cardboard and I am determined to bake my own cheesecakes from now on.

This year my mom found another recipe that included gelatin. We excitedly agreed that THIS was to be the year that we conquered the booger gelatin cake. As my mom sat down the night before our birthday to read the recipe she realized that it had eggs in it even though the cake was never baked, only refrigerated. Grossed out we all opted for an oldie but a goodie: Cheesecake with chocolate ganache topping! The topping tastes like the inside of a chocolate truffle and my mom describes it as "wicked good"! Jealous?

Besides cake the birthday bash was fun. Annabelle wanted to go to Chuck E Cheese's and so we made sure to go. Annabelle had requested of my mom that she have a "king, queen, princess, castle, pony, unicorn, rainbow" birthday cake. My mom did her best and found a cake with a rainbow and three princesses. Annabelle was satisfied. Our friends Alma & Nicole met us at Chuck E. Cheese as well. Their little Jagger and Annabelle enjoyed the arcade and the pizza.

Another memorable circumstance of this year's celebration was the INSANE cold front that hit Colorado right before we got there. Who would have guessed that we would have had snow and sooo much ice on our birthdays?

Mike got up early one morning and took some beautiful pictures of what autumn looks like when frost comes early. We'll post those along with some of our other favorite landscape pictures from the trip soon.