Birthday Weekend
Jun. 20th, 2011 03:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fenchurchFirst off, thank you so much for all your birthday wishes! I've tried to go through and reply to them all individually, but I suspect I may have missed a few. I must say, it's always fun to watch birthday greetings start to roll in as the clock ticks over to the 19th all around the world. I love the modern age!
Since my birthday landed on Father's Day this year, we decided to try having a shindig on Saturday instead. Friday, I baked the cake and I was just about to start some water boiling for potatoes and eggs (to make potato salad) when it occurred to me that I didn't really want to do it and, well, the potato salad at PCC Natural Food Market is actually pretty darned tasty (if way too expensive) and it was my birthday, darn it! So, Saturday morning I started the chicken marinating for Guamanian Chicken, hit PCC to buy potato salad, whipped up some dips using goat yogurt, made some frosting using goat butter and goat milk (won't be doing that again... I actually like the taste of goat dairy, but it really didn't work for me on cake), decorated the cake, grilled some chicken and had a party!
There was a definite theme this year...
Here's a shot of the cake with one of my presents (still in the special wrapping that my brother-in-law made for it). I realized afterward that I should have also put one of the presents fromtomte and gidgiddoni in that photo, too... they gave me a bowl of petunias with a paper thought-bubble saying "Oh no, not again." Hee!
Yesterday for my birthday, I slept in... then indulged in my favorite completely-full-of-sugar-and-so-totally-bad-for-me cereal (at the moment, that would be Lucky Charms) for breakfast, after which we loaded up the cooler with leftovers from the night before and headed out to Mukilteo to catch the ferry to Whidbey Island. We had a fantastic day just meandering our way up the island, doing some hiking and finding caches as we went. We ended up finding 28 Geocaches! *Really* good for unplanned caching (we've found more in a day before, but it was during a Cache Machine... they're plotted out with a route to get the most caches in the least amount of time).
On the way home, we stopped at Deception Pass to do some caching and admire the sights. We'd driven over the bridge before, but this was the first time we'd stopped at the view area... and as part of doing the Earthcache there, we had to walk out partway onto the bridge. FREAKY!!! About 200 feet above the water, with a side rail that only went to about waist height. I kept getting little shots of vertigo while walking along it.
Then we took the stairs under the bridge and out along one of the trails to a barely there side trail that we only knew about because it led to a Geocache... and an incredible view of the bridge at sunset!
When we'd walked out on the bridge, we'd had to make note of the condition of the tide for the Earthcache... and at the time, it looked to be just at the end of high tide, with a very subtle indication that the water was starting to pull out to sea. On the walk back from the viewpoint, the water was roaringly loud and when we got back to the bridge, we could see whirlpools and rapids as the water was practically sucked out to sea! Very funky that it happened so fast!
Anyway, it was very fun but full day and we crashed pretty much as soon as we got home last night. Now I've got the mad scramble of getting ready to leave for JadeCon this week!
Crossposted from my Livejournal
Since my birthday landed on Father's Day this year, we decided to try having a shindig on Saturday instead. Friday, I baked the cake and I was just about to start some water boiling for potatoes and eggs (to make potato salad) when it occurred to me that I didn't really want to do it and, well, the potato salad at PCC Natural Food Market is actually pretty darned tasty (if way too expensive) and it was my birthday, darn it! So, Saturday morning I started the chicken marinating for Guamanian Chicken, hit PCC to buy potato salad, whipped up some dips using goat yogurt, made some frosting using goat butter and goat milk (won't be doing that again... I actually like the taste of goat dairy, but it really didn't work for me on cake), decorated the cake, grilled some chicken and had a party!
There was a definite theme this year...
Here's a shot of the cake with one of my presents (still in the special wrapping that my brother-in-law made for it). I realized afterward that I should have also put one of the presents from
tomte and gidgiddoni in that photo, too... they gave me a bowl of petunias with a paper thought-bubble saying "Oh no, not again." Hee!Yesterday for my birthday, I slept in... then indulged in my favorite completely-full-of-sugar-and-so-totally-bad-for-me cereal (at the moment, that would be Lucky Charms) for breakfast, after which we loaded up the cooler with leftovers from the night before and headed out to Mukilteo to catch the ferry to Whidbey Island. We had a fantastic day just meandering our way up the island, doing some hiking and finding caches as we went. We ended up finding 28 Geocaches! *Really* good for unplanned caching (we've found more in a day before, but it was during a Cache Machine... they're plotted out with a route to get the most caches in the least amount of time).
On the way home, we stopped at Deception Pass to do some caching and admire the sights. We'd driven over the bridge before, but this was the first time we'd stopped at the view area... and as part of doing the Earthcache there, we had to walk out partway onto the bridge. FREAKY!!! About 200 feet above the water, with a side rail that only went to about waist height. I kept getting little shots of vertigo while walking along it.
Then we took the stairs under the bridge and out along one of the trails to a barely there side trail that we only knew about because it led to a Geocache... and an incredible view of the bridge at sunset!
When we'd walked out on the bridge, we'd had to make note of the condition of the tide for the Earthcache... and at the time, it looked to be just at the end of high tide, with a very subtle indication that the water was starting to pull out to sea. On the walk back from the viewpoint, the water was roaringly loud and when we got back to the bridge, we could see whirlpools and rapids as the water was practically sucked out to sea! Very funky that it happened so fast!
Anyway, it was very fun but full day and we crashed pretty much as soon as we got home last night. Now I've got the mad scramble of getting ready to leave for JadeCon this week!
Crossposted from my Livejournal
