a birthday and a cake

Yesterday was my birthday. I almost didn't make myself a cake. I almost let myself be mopey. Sometimes birthdays make me grumpy. Instead, I bought myself some presents and made Mike take me out to lunch. (We had the most delicious tacos here.) While Elliot napped, I baked this cake. And yesterday ended up being pretty fantastic after all. A lot of that had to do with all of the sweet notes that were left on my instagram account. Man alive, thank you, friends! I had a permanent smile on my face all day long.

But yes, the cake. Bake one immediately, please. It is the pumpkin cake of your dreams. (I brought out my latent math skills and only made one squat little layer instead of three. One was just the right amount for our little family of 6. I didn't want to have to face any leftovers this morning, as I surely would have eaten them for breakfast and regretted it immediately.)