Happy Birthday to My Handsome Husband!

I like April 18th--it's the day the love of my life was born!  I want to celebrate in grand style, with balloons and streamers and ponies and fireworks...or at least a proper birthday cake and presents and maybe just one or two balloons.  But life got in the way this year.

Mike went to work at 6 a.m. as usual, when I was just getting off night shift in Seoul (thankfully my last one for a few weeks).  I took the train up to Dongducheon and met my hardworking husband on his lunch break at the tax office (taxes turned out to be more complicated than I'd hoped).  We grabbed a quick lunch on base, then Mike went back to work.  He worked until 6 p.m., then we went straight from there to a change of command for another company, so we didn't get home until around 7:30.

To make things worse, in my sleep-deprived brain-addled state, I had forgotten to bring the gifts I'd wrapped up to Dongducheon.  I'd also forgotten that the commissary is closed on Mondays, so I wasn't able to get the ingredients for Mom's coconut cake that Mike likes so much.  What to do?

I ended up making a cake and icing from scratch.  The cake turned out to be dry, but the icing was fantastic.  Here's the recipe, if you're interested.

We had a quiet evening at home, and I went to bed early.  "Kind of a bummer birthday party, no?"  I said.  "On the bright side," my sweet husband pointed out, "we're together today for the first time ever."  True, true.