I'm 30!

I turned 30 two days ago.  I don't feel any different, except that now I feel the need for daily exercise, which is probably a good thing.  To be fair, this started a couple of weeks ago, not just with my birthday, but I am really getting concerned about my body staying healthy and flexible so that I can hike, climb, dance, and just play with my kids as they get older.

It's weird to think about the goals I once had for myself by this age.  I was certainly going to be done having my four children by now, I was going to be a successful veterinarian who had graduated from UC Davis, I would be happily married and living in an awesome house in Pacific Beach (in San Diego) with my husband, and of course we were both going to be thin and fit beach-goers who surfed at least twice a week when the waves would permit.  Crazy, huh?  Yeah, I know that NOW, but I was raised to believe that I was capable of anything I set my mind to.  I also had a mother who had given birth to 6 children by the time she was 30, so I figured it wouldn't be hard to have 4 children with a decent amount of time spaced between each.  Sigh...naivety.  

So, I made myself a corn-free triple chocolate birthday cake that turned out pretty yummy.  I think I'd change the mousse filling next time and make it sweeter, but my best friend disagrees.  She thinks the richness of a whipped dark chocolate ganache is perfect.  Anyway, here's my yummy recipe for a delicious, moist chocolate cake.  Bonus: it's a one-bowl recipe!  I love making tasty food with minimal clean-up!

One-Bowl Moist Chocolate Cake

2 c. white sugar

1 3/4 c. all-purpose flour

3/4 c. unsweetened cocoa powder

1 1/2 tsp. baking powder (I use Featherweight brand so it's corn-free)

1 1/2 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. salt

2 eggs

1 c. milk

1/2 c. vegetable oil (use canola, soybean, or another non-corn oil)

2 tsp. vanilla extract (I use my homemade vanilla.  Recipe on bottom)

1 c. boiling water

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C.)  Grease and flour two 9-inch round pans.  In a large bowl, mix all dry ingredients.  Add eggs, oil, milk, and vanilla and mix with mixer for 2 min.  Stir in the boiling water last.  Batter will be thin.  Pour evenly into two pans.  (This makes 6 cups of batter, for those of you, like me, who have only one 9 inch round pan that you have to clean and re-use to make a layer cake!)  Bake for 30 minutes until cake tests done with a toothpick.  Cool completely before frosting.

Corn-free Vanilla Extract

one 750 ml bottle of potato vodka

2 vanilla beans

Put the vanilla beans in the potato vodka and wait at least 3 weeks.  I waited 6, and mine tasted great!  It will not be as dark as the vanilla extract you buy in the store, but it tastes fine and it's way cheaper.  No one has noticed a difference in my house!

My birthday was fun, even though it happened midweek and only a couple of people could join me for cake.  My son was unusually well-behaved (unlike now...he's hanging off my shirt and pulling on me as I type,) and my husband and I (sans child) ate at The Keg, which is a really tasty steakhouse.

Warning: TMI ahead

My 30th birthday had one surprise left at bedtime.  Let me just say that this has never happened to me before, and I thought that if I could do such a thing that I would've discovered it before now.  I'm one of those women who is blessed with vaginal orgasms.  I can have amazing, multiple orgasms with penetrative sex, not just oral.  It's nice.  In fact, I didn't know that not all women were like me until my mid-20's.  It made me sad to think that not everyone could do what I took for granted.  Anyway, I have to say that the one thing I was thankful for, besides said orgasms, was that I was not a female ejaculator.  Those women, rare as they are, have to deal with the most unpleasant part of sex for a man: the messy clean-up.  So, surprise, surprise, I received an interesting gift that night.  Yes, I squirted.  It was lame.  I was not pleased.  More than that, I was really shocked and so was my husband!  I thought that the women who did make such messes only did so for an extraordinary orgasmic experience.  Not so.  I mean, it was good.  It was really good, in fact.  But it wasn't the best, not by a long shot.  The best orgasms I've ever had are still from my second trimester of pregnancy.  Those were mind-blowingly incredible!  This was just an 8 out of 10.  Weird.

In short, I think the universe has a strange sense of humor.  Happy Birthday!  Now go wash your sheets.