Birthday Celebration

Yesterday, we celebrated my birthday and instead of a day full of non-stop excitement (remember last year...)

this year was more subdued. Last year, we had just arrived in Seattle and we were on a major "high" of excitement of being back in town after 17 years. Since my birthday was on a Saturday, I did a lot on that day. This year was a Monday, Bruce was out working all day on a job at Fremont Brewing and I am recuperating from foot surgery for a Morton's neuroma which means about two weeks of not walking much. (It took exactly sixteen minutes for the podiatrist to fix it, yet still two weeks for recovery)

I have a boot-type shoe that I can get around as it heals. Today, is Day 7 so I am getting around pretty good now so it didn't hinder my birthday celebration last night at one of our favorite restaurants, Palisade.

I had to schedule this foot surgery at a time when we didn't have a lot on the calendar which was challenging. Even though it's a busy birthday month, there really isn't a lot on the calendar for us. And how hard is it to party at a favorite restaurant? Not hard at all. I can manage that with a boot on my foot.

We all met at the bar since we were all coming from various places, Bruce from Fremont Brewing, Lauren from her internship, me from home and my sister, Barbara and husband, Jim, also joined us. (Four cars for five people, not the most efficient transportation for a city known for it's traffic congestion...oh, well)

Palisade has wonderful drinks. I started off with a cranberry/pomegranate mojito. So refreshing. Lauren also ordered one as soon as she arrived. My second drink was a guava margarita - and I had a smile on my face.

The food is always superb here and so is the scenery. Mt. Rainier was lit up as we watched the sunset from our table. It was a wonderful way to end my day.

Add a birthday dessert and the evening was perfect...

(Spiced banana ice cream sundae with salted caramel ice cream, toasted almond granola, housemade caramel sauce, and caramelized bananas) Happy Birthday to me!

Reflecting on the past year - which went by awfully fast, by-the-way - Bruce and I still comment all the time how good it feels to be "home". I know now, it will take longer than a year for it to really sink in because it's already been a year and we still feel like we have to constantly pinch ourselves. I said during dinner last night that I hope by next year, we will feel more like venturing out and exploring the surrounding areas here because there are so many places to experience besides just Seattle. I was reminded that we did go up north and experience the daffodil festival which was a very fun outing. For now, we seem to just be happy hanging around town; Seattle stirs up so many memories of our past. It's like walking back in time. Seeing all the places where Nick and Lauren played when they were little; places where Bruce and I dated, got married, became parents. Which leads me to my best birthday present of all, my new grand-baby! Hana was born June 30th to Nick and Sachiyo in Japan and she wished me a Happy Birthday on Facebook which totally thrilled me. I am a typical Grandma and think she is the most beautiful baby in the world.

"Happy Birthday, grandma! I hope you will have a wonderful day."

That was my best birthday present of all, seeing her beautiful little face pop up. Wow! It took my breath away. We've gotten a lot of photos of her, of course, we FaceTime, iMessage, and Nick even sent us a video of her yawning. Each time she looks more and more mature so each time it is such a thrill because she is changing so fast and she's only 2 weeks old. I can tell I'm going to love being a Grandma. Life just keeps getting better. Happy Birthday to me!

Meatloaf by Mark Bittman

Once again, I turned on the television yesterday and saw that Mark Bittman was on the Today show and was making his version of meatloaf . This must be meatloaf season. It was surprisingly similar to the Pioneer Woman's version who was also recently on. I was a little surprised of his version because Mark Bittman is into healthy eating and has lost a lot of weight and improved his health by changing his diet which he writes about in his book, Food Matters . His meatloaf recipe also included bacon and cheese! I must be doing something wrong. The thing to remember, which he writes about in his book, is that you can eat healthy without going extreme or changing your whole life. If you don't know who Mark Bittman is, he is a food writer and a four star chef with multiple cookbooks who loves to eat but changed his food philosophy to improve his health. He tells his story in Food Matters and provides a plan for responsible eating that covers a no-nonsense rundown on

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Spinach Stuffed Cod

Last night, I was in the mood for a healthy dinner so decided to experiment with a recipe I found from a blog called Creative in My Kitchen . Lauren and Ari brought us French cookies back from their trip to Paris and I basically inhaled them. They were so good! We were cat-sitting their two cats while they were gone. They liked lounging in the strangest places... I found one of their toys while I was cleaning so Lauren stopped by last night to pick it up on her way home from work. I was experimenting with this recipe which originally called for chicken breast but I thought it sounded good to substitute fish instead since I'm always looking for good fish recipes. We all thought it was totally delicious. When I went to the grocery store, they had Icelandic cod on sale so I bought about 2 pounds of that. You could use any white fish for this recipe such as: true cod or other cod rockfish halibut had

Sylvia's Scenario

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