Mom's 80th Birthday Party - She Opens Her Special Present XO!

Mom getting ready to make a wish

For Mom's 80th birthday my sister Melinda made the special 1-2-3-4 cake that my Grandmother (Mom's mother) used to make and it turned out perfect. Every bit of it is from scratch, including the delectable from scratch chocolate icing. It has a flavor that you never forget. Not an easy cake to make like my Grandmother did; cooking time really matters for moisture, and texture is everything depending on the recipe, but it's well worth the effort, thanks Mel!! She also put little heart shaped candles on it as well as the number 80 and some more colored ones for good luck - some of the candles made colored flame, which I had never seen before, oh the wonders of this world today : )

I should probably add that Mom wanted a pizza party (she declares she's forever 35 in her mind, and we have TUMS) - so we ordered several pizzas from Facia Luna, where my beloved son Torey worked for a number of years while working through his college degree at Penn State. 

I made the salad - 3 heads of romaine lettuce, chopped, with capers, artichoke hearts, kalamata olives, a little roasted red pepper for color, cucumbers, scallions, shaved Italian cheeses, and a light red wine vinegar and olive oil dressing. Yum. It was a nice complement to the pizza.

Yep, the tissues were at hand and everyone needed one!

The suspense was killing us as we waited for the right time to give Mom her special present. My sis knew that we'd all cry when Mom got a look at her very personalized commissioned painting, and she had a fresh box of tissues on every table in the living room : )

My favorite photo

My iPhone is an old model and doesn't do much to accommodate indoor evening lighting, so apologies for the photo quality - this is my favorite photo cause both Mom and Melinda have their tissues at hand and are talking about the details in the beautiful painting.

My brother had invited my sis and myself over to his house when the painting arrived and we all sat on the floor with the painting propped up against his couch exclaiming every time we recognized a new detail that was transferred to this beautiful painterly world from Mom's reality. We loved watching as Mom went through these same discoveries.

Wow, Rick Alexander really trumped it with this one!!!!

As a souvenir, we each received a little booklet of images of details in the painting along with some beautiful quotes Rick chose and some description of the details. I asked Mom to sign mine, and the message she wrote is very beautiful and special. She said "Forever my love to my dearest middle child and such a memorable 80th birthday from your all loving Mom. Boy do my three kids ROCK!!!"  : ))))

Mom was enchanted, as we knew she would be, and every time she looks at this beautiful painting she'll remember how very much we love her and how special it has been to celebrate her 80th birthday together.

GOOD TIMES!! Thanks Rick!!

Namaste,
Jen