As I write this cool things are still happening in the kitchen. We need to head off to worship team practice before too long so we are going to have half a birthday dinner before we go. We did the same thing last week when it was Andrew’s birthday. The girls asked if they could cook his birthday dinner and of course I agreed. L15 did cherry tomatoes stuffed with goat’s cheese for starters followed by fettucine in a creamy seafood sauce. After we arrived home from worship team A13 had a carrot cake with cream cheese icing ready for us.
It is now night and we have done all our eating. A13 did the starter and main tonight and L15 made dessert. A13 knows I love Chinese and she did a spectacular job; we had Pork Wontons followed by Hunan Chicken and Stir-fried Bokchoy on steamed rice. Once we got back from music practice we ate the delicious Lemon Meringue Pie that Laura had made, but not before the younger two children had sucked helium out of a birthday balloon and sung “Happy Birthday”.
While much of this wonderful food was being prepared this afternoon I was indulging in my current favourite pastime, watercolour painting. I have been teaching art on Friday mornings to the Group of 3, so I have had the watercolours out along with a huge pile of books on watercolour painting from the library. Today I sat down to try something a little different from the paintings I have been doing, but ended up doing yet another snow scene. Now is the perfect time to mention the gift my children bought me. The first thing I pulled out of the gift bag was a flyer for a sale at Wallacks art store…the other thing I pulled out was a gift card to Wallacks art store. Sale ends Saturday. Here’s this afternoon’s art. ( you can click to see actual size)
This account of birthday business would not be complete without a peek into the world of a sound technician. My job doing sound for the worship team Andrew and L are in has recently gained a higher profile. Instead of being tucked away in a room off in the back left hand corner of the church I now get to sit in a booth at the back of the church which is raised a couple of feet higher than everyone in the congregation. No hiding now when some unexpected and inexplicable technical hitch occurs. That is not the only change; gone is the 16 channel sound board which used to surprise me in many and varied ways. In its place is a pretty new thing with a few hundred gizmos and thingamajigs to do any number of clever and exciting things. I know that is fairly technical jargon, but I think you get the idea! All went smoothly tonight and L15 snapped a few shots to show you the cool new board and my equally cool new travel mug.
Birthday business has been very sweet indeed today, I received a lovely collection of calls, emails and cards from very special people and was totally spoiled and blessed by my family.
Sentient 
How great to read of a wonderful birthday celebration spreading through the whole day and reaching into many of its activities. What a talented family, too! They do not simply do the traditional thing of “breakfast in bed” for Mum on her birthday. They provide meals and treats with sophisticated names.
As Heather knows, her birthday is always followed immediately by another significant anniversary – that of her parents’ wedding – and it was no different this year. In fact, with a time difference of 16 hours, we find ourselves celebrating birthday and wedding anniversary concurrently, even if we are half a world apart.
For us, the anniversary did not involve special meal treats on this occasion although we did go to a new cafe restaurant in a neighbouring suburb. It makes a feature of its gluten free cakes and slices so we expected that R would be able to select something tasty to go with the pot of herbal tea. Sadly, on this day the cafe had received very good patronage and the selection of treats was greatly diminished by the time of our visit late afternoon. Packaged cookies is all that was left.
Still, it was a pleasant afternoon and we enjoyed each other’s company. I was able to celebrate with an iced mocha accompanied by raisin scones with jam and cream.
The day finished with attendance at our fortnightly neighbourhood study group where we shared our anniversary news with members of the group.
The celebratory theme continues on Saturday as Matt, cousin of L15, A13 and B9 and younger brother of Luke who featured in an earlier blog, has a “surf party” at the coast.
Now we have entered the fiftieth year of marriage. I wonder what next year’s celebrations will mean.