Tinkerbell and Strawberry cake

I did a couple of birthday cakes for a friend so I thought I'd post the pictures. The pictures are from her cell phone, so they're not the best, but I didn't take any pictures because frankly my brain is not fully functional yet. On the up side, despite the constant crying as of late, it appears that Timothy may not have colic after all. We went in to the pediatrician for a follow up appointment for Christopher (more below) and I had him check Timothy's ears while we were there and the poor baby has raging ear infections.

So Christopher come to me crying Thursday afternoon. It took a minute to calm him down, but when he did he finally got out what the problem was. "Mom, Ryan made me swallow a battery!" Fan-freakin-tastic. It turns out the he got the button battery out of his book light and was just messing around with the stupid thing in his mouth and accidentally swallowed it. Poor Ryan just happened to be witness to the incident which means he-of course-had to be at fault as it couldn't be Christophers'.

Apparently my child isn't the only one out there with a penchant for appetizers of the alkaline variety though. There is a special hot-line just for button battery swallowers. We had to drive up to Texas Childrens Hospital and do x-rays and sit around for 5 hours because-shocker-no one at our hospital is qualified to fish the thing out if that's what needed to happen. Luckily we had Timothy with us and the nurses felt he was too young to sit out in the waiting room with the sick people so we got to go to an exam room that had a tv and watch the Discovery Channel while we waited. It seemed to be moving along and, after much debate, it was decided that we would be allowed to go home. On the way up to Houston Thursday Christopher asked me if they would have to cut him open to get it out and I told him that they wouldn't because they have a special tool that could go down his throat and into his tummy to get it. Jon said he'd get to eat lots of ice cream if that happened and then Christopher was hoping that it wouldn't come out after all. Crazy kid.

We're going in today for another x-ray and as long as the thing is still moving we're good to go. If it's stuck somewhere they'll have to go in and get it out so it doesn't start leaking acid. So everyone keep your fingers crossed for us okay. I swear, if you know my kids you'd think it would be Ethan going to the emergency room all the time, but it's always Christopher.

Oh, I'm also posting the recipe for homemade strawberry cake because I told Brandi I would. So, here you go dear....


Homemade Strawberry Cake-makes about 8 cups of batter
Adapted from A Dash of Sass's strawberry cake which was adapted from Paula Deen’s Hummingbird Cake
 (See Brandi, I'm not the only one who can't stick to a recipe as written.)

3 cups flour, tapped down and leveled off and then sifted
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups pureed strawberries
1/3 cup sour cream
4 large eggs
1 cup sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 teaspoon lemon zest

Preheat oven to 325. Spray and flour three 8-by-2-inch round cake pans, tapping out excess flour; set aside. In a large bowl combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt; set aside. Puree the strawberries in a food processor adding in sour cream, extracts and lemon zest at the end to incorporate. Pour into the bowl with the flour and mix together. It will be thick. Without rinsing out the bowl, add the eggs and sugar to the food processor and process 30 seconds. Then, with the food processor running, pour the vegetable oil in a slow stream. (Like you would to make mayo.) Let that process another 30 seconds or so. Fold into the batter. Divide batter evenly between prepared pans. Bake, rotating pans halfway through, until the tops spring back when gently pressed with your fingertips, 26 to 28 minutes. Transfer pans to a wire rack to cool 10 minutes before taking them out of the pan to cool completely. They will shrink away from the edges of the pan a bit. I liked it with fresh whipped cream, but any icing works.