February fun

Where has the month gone? I usually love cooking in February because I can do a lot of extraneous baking for Valentine's day, birthdays, because the weather is cold, you name it. This month, I can only think of two or three things I baked. One was this cocoa layer cake for a friend's 35th birthday party. I found pictures of the birthday girl and all of the people invited to the party (thanks, facebook), printed them and made little cardboard hearts to decorate the cake with. I saw something similar on Martha Stewart recently, but when I tried to find it on her busy website I couldn't, so I just made up my own version. I think it came out rather cute.

The cake got lots of rave reviews too, but who doesn't love a rich and moist chocolate cake? I didn't think it was one of my best but I did make it twice this month!

I also made this chicken pot pie recently--a comfort staple. But for all its down home simplicity, it is pretty labor intensive for a weeknight meal if you make it from scratch like I did. I had cooked the chicken the day before and used the leftovers in this. I had also made the pie crust who knows when and pulled it out of the freezer. But even still, it seemed like a lot of work. I guess because there are a lot of elements that are cooked separately and then put together before being baked. Ok, but it *was* delicious, especially when heated up for lunch the next day.

The highlight of this month was a trip I took to Iowa City to visit one of my best friends and her little girl who was born a month before mine. They are new b.f.f.s and it was soooo cute to see them interact and get to know each other as well as to reconnect with an old friend. Here are a few shots of the snowy weekend.

Happy February everyone!