Happy Birthday Baby!



Dude awoke to a hundred balloons covering his bedroom floor.

I LOVE birthdays!! I genuinely don't care about mine all that much--don't get me wrong, if you bring me hoopla I'll gladly take it! But I absolutely love other people's birthdays! I love making people smile and feel special. It's my fave. I love how the Gilmores do it up right for birthdays. Rory especially got into celebrating others'. For Lorelai's birthday she made "the world's largest pizza" (so she let Lorelai believe; "apparently the worlds largest pizza was 122 feet 8 inches, and Litchfield made one last year that was 98 feet...")

and for Logan's birthday she went all out bringing him the highlights of her best birthdays to make up for all of his previous lack-luster birthdays.
  I'd fit right in with the girls here. I absolutely love making a big deal out of birthdays! In honor of my son's 7th birthday last week I thought I'd kick things off with a salute to the birthday episodes. As far as I can tell (mostly from memory and with minimal research) four birthdays were celebrated over the course of the show: Rory's 16th and 21st, Lorelai's 35th, and Logan's 25th (there is also an episode where Lorelai and Rory have a belated 21st birthday weekend after they are reconciled).
 I wanted to start my son's big day off right the way Luke did for Rory at the diner.
For breakfast I was going to make him coffee cake. Unfortunately Dude is allergic to cinnamon, so I'll save the birthday coffee cake for my own birthday. So instead he had seasonal Pumpkin Pie Pop Tarts. I'm pretty sure Lorelai would not only approve, but buy them in bulk for the off-season. He didn't have the coffee cake, but I made sure to put helium balloons at his breakfast spot. He also awoke to find the entire floor of his room covered with balloons--he's still young enough to think they magically appeared as I tried to hide my yawns and sleepy eyes after staying up late blowing up a hundred balloons.

Sookie's birthday menu for Rory's Sweet 16 included Mini Orange Biscuits with Honey Mustard, Ham and Cheddar.

So a variation of these adorable little sandwiches made their way into Dude's lunch box. My son doesn't care for condiments (weirdo) so I omitted the honey mustard. We also didn't have cheddar, so I used colby jack and muenster cut into star shapes. I put them in his lunch box so he could assemble his own sandwiches.

     We didn't attempt the world's largest pizza for this birthday, but we did have homemade pizza, mac and cheese and chocolate pudding for dessert. Emily served their chocolate pudding in crystal bowls. I had to settle for my plastic goblets.



 

I also made my own whipped cream with a little sugar and a drop of almond extract

Dude is also fortunate enough to have his actual birthday on Halloween. We had a fun filled birthday weekend with trick-or-treating, birthday treats for his whole class, and making and eating these yummy recipes together.

 

(Full disclosure our mac and cheese was Stouffers.Why mess with a classic?--but we did share it right out of one big bowl.)

 I think that's it for now. What about you Gilmore Fans? Do you go all out for birthdays? What's your fondest bday memory? Did I forget any birthdays that were featured on the show?
Discuss.