Thank you!

Hey guys!

So, today's my birthday and, gosh, am I a lucky human! Here, I'm gonna do a round-up of all the wonderful events of the day...

At 09:16 in the morning, I get a text from Mexx telling me to go over to her's at 11:00. When the time comes and I arrive, I had no idea that everyone was there already! It was such a lovely surprise :)
[Note: By 'everyone', I mean Mexx, Stas, Wadz, ArwaChihuahua, Ruby and the Beckster. ANT arrived later.]

During the day, we had pizza (we experimented with hot and cold pizza and I think the group is pretty much split on which is better) and then proceeded to try out some of the cakes that people brought.
But before we get onto the cake, some cards were opened and presents unwrapped.

The first card that I read was from Wadz. It was hand-made and frankly hilarious, with a poem on the front and several illustrations of Voldemort and Nagini (dressed, in a bowler hat, as Edgar Allen Poe) inside and on the back. Some of my favourite jokes were 'hugs and kisses' (imagine the way Voldemort starts saying Avada Kedavra, and transfer that to the way you say 'hugs' in 'hugs and kisses') and also a sketch of Nagini as a bartender. Based on when Voldemort commands Nagini to kill Snape ("Nagini...kill."), this time it was "Nagini...bill!" Take a look...

Here's a selection of some of the wonderful presents that I got:

On the right, in this photo, there's the wonderful rose-scented candles and the beautiful light holder, which are both from the Beckster. It has to be said that the Beckster gives the most creative of gifts, so when we asked her where she gets all these lovely things from, her reply was that she loves the garden centre. So there you have it, the garden centre is the place to be!

You can also see some pretty bath products on the right, which are from Mexx. In case you were wondering, those also smell like roses. It's like they planned it!

So, let's talk cakes...

The first of many cakes that we tried was Stas' brownies, which can be seen in the photo on the left along with a selection of cupcakes by ArwaChihuahua. You are probably thinking, 'Why is there only one in the photo?' Well, the answer is that we ate most of them and this was the only one left. (In case you were wondering, most of these photos were taken after the gathering.)
So, onto the actual brownie, this tasted exquisite, with pieces of walnut and chocoloate. I think that the Beckster would agree with me that it was a little crumbly, so we ended up going outside to shake it out and, in Ruby's case, crumble to our hearts' content. [Quote: "I just want to go outside and crumble." - Ruby]

Next, we admired Ruby's home-made cake pops. I think it's fair to say that we found it amazing that she has a machine specifically designed to make these (how nifty). Props to whoever invented cake pops and the machine to make them in.

Note to all who value chronology: By this time, ANT had just arrived.
Along with her, ANT brought perhaps the most colourful item of the whole day, so feast your eyes on it below:
[Photo credits go to ANT.]

Now, the first time that everyone saw this, we were all mind-blown. Featuring the Hulk (top), a snail with a sunshine-yellow shell (bottom), boccia balls (right) and daisies, photos of this creation were almost immediately posted on several social media sites, including Wadz's Instagram (along with the post, we went pretty crazy hashtagging a couple things: #birthday #hulk #smash #BOCCIA). During the course of the gathering, the picture competed with Wadz's picture of some artistically arranged boxes, which has her highest number of 'likes': 9. By the end of the gathering, it became official that the pic of the cake paralleled Wadz's box pic, both with 9 'likes'. We'll keep you posted if it reaches a new record...
So, after seeing this cake, you're probably wondering how on Earth ANT managed to draw the Hulk onto it. Well, funnily enough, we thought the same thing, so we decided to ask. Needless to say, the reply we got was a classic: "I just Googled a picture of the Hulk." - ANT. It's funny that everyone was expecting a whole design and production process, but no, ANT simply said that she went ahead and drew it on, free-hand. Skills.
In other behind-the-scenes news, close contenders of the caption on the cake were, 'Have a smashin' day!' and plenty more from the same Hulk semantic field.
We managed to finish the whole cake, with many of us taking away pieces, including Ruby, who took a slice for Wicks, who unfortunately was not able to attend. One thing that should be noted before eating this is that it contains a fair amount of sugar and you are pretty much guaranteed to be on a sugar high for the following couple of hours upon ingestion.

Onto less sugary things, we tried out some cookies made by Mexx. This was perhaps the more sensible option, instead of ANT's hyper sugar cake, which the Beckster, Ruby and Wadz gladly took. I think it's fair to say that the cookies were received rather well.

Whilst on the topic of cakes, I'd like to thank ConscienceSarah for these wonderful fairy cakes that she gave me before the end of term. They were simply charming :)

So, I think this is where the post comes to an end.
Thank you to everyone for making this the best birthday ever! It truly means a lot to have such wonderful friends like you :)

Until next time,

- Master