Strawberry Cake

Last Saturday, we celebrated my mother-in-law, Betty’s, 83rd birthday with a steak dinner at our house. Unfortunately, her two sons and one grandson living in Michigan were unable to attend. Her other grandson did attend, but minus his wife because she is in Australia visiting friends. Damn, she makes me mad; we should be there too! Oh well, that’s another blog…

It’s true; I have the best mother-in-law in the world. I call her mother, because mine passed about the same time as Betty’s husband in 1996. The first time I called her mom she protested that she wasn’t my mother. I simply reminded her that she was the only mom I had. From that point on she no longer protested, and in fact seems comfortable having another son.

It is apparent that there is some truth to the term generation gap, because she and I don’t see eye to eye on most issues. One thing we do agree on is strawberry cake. After a great dinner, we surprised her with the most scrumptious strawberry cake you have ever seen. It may have been store bought, but it looked and tasted fantastic. We dug into the cake like wild banshees even though we were stuffed from Sirloin steak, mashed potatoes, deviled eggs and fresh green salad.

After desert, the group looked like fattened pigs on market day. There is nothing like a good meal to reaffirm family ties and remind us of how lucky we are to live in a country like America.

Strawberry cake also reminds us that spring has sprung, and not too soon for me. Bring on summer, watermelon, swimming, hamburgers, cold drinks and family. Life is good and I am loving it…

Mittster