What a Great Day

In the aftermath of our birthdays, I must confess, we had a really nice day, and part of that was pushing dumplings out of psyche. We had decided that we would not work on or even mention the word "dumplings" on our big day, and we succeeded in doing that, with a minor slip-up or two now and again.

Now R and I aren't big sticklers for celebrating our birthday, and prefer to let it just pass by without much fanfare, but we've been working like dogs for the past several months (for what, I couldn't tell you), and the kids get a huge kick out of preparing for and celebrating the day.

In fact, they did a fabulous job making a bunch of handmade presents. They were holed up in the school room for days, telling mom and dad that entry by us was forbidden, and worked really hard on their gifts. Let me tell you, they did an amazing job. Some of the best presents ever. I love when they make the cards by themselves, it's so much fun.

We opened presents in the morning, then took a nice long walk along the ski trail into town to have breakfast at our favorite restaurant, Stella's. We figured there would be a crowd, which there was, and we got to see a bunch of our friends, including JM, B, RW, P, ST, and a bunch of people we knew by sight but not by name. Even some FM people. Don't you love life in a small town? RW and P came over and asked how the dumplings were doing and I almost fainted. Just kidding.

After breakfast, the plan was to go for a kayak ride at the Hartland Dam, then back home for our local supper followed by cake and ice cream. The cake was from Lou's, their chocolate mousse cake, and is one of my all-time favorites. Amazing stuff.

It was a busy but super-nice day, just doing fun stuff and avoiding dumplings at all costs. Sure, it will come back to haunt us, but we enjoyed it in the meantime.

Until the next time, thanks for reading, and thanks to ARL and NRL for the pics.


spent a great day
kids made us presents
breakfast at stellas, saw all of our friends