40th Anniversary Celebration

Our third celebration of the month popped up over the weekend after my birthday on the 11th and Nick's birthday on the 8th. I wrote about them here. On Sunday, July 18th, we had our 40th anniversary. We probably would have done something remarkable like take a fancy trip somewhere or take a cruise or go somewhere outstanding had it been normal times. I don't feel like these are normal times even though the government has "opened up" everything again. The cruise ships in Elliot Bay were all lined up this weekend to begin their cruises to Alaska again so things are trying to get back to normal.

We had to go down to the beach and see them because it was such an abnormal sight after a year of shut down.

I do not feel motivated to hop on a cruise ship just yet or to travel anywhere at this point. Aside from covid still running rampant, I don't feel like going anywhere because this is the best time of the year to enjoy living in Seattle. We moved back six years ago but we still feel like we are on a vacation living here. So, we celebrated right here. We did decide to venture out of town to see more of the area...after we went down to see the cruise ships first. We drove to Tacoma and checked out an up and coming area there called Point Ruston,

It is a relatively new waterfront park with walking trails and picnic areas. One area has a mall-type layout with a movie theater and multiple restaurants to choose from. We spent our time at the waterfront park area and walked on some of the trails. You can see ships in the Tacoma harbor and the Vashon ferry going back and forth with Mt. Rainier in the background so it is very scenic.

I admit that I've never spent much time in Tacoma. Being from Seattle, Tacoma was always the butt of all the jokes and known as more of the industrial, foul smelling neighbor of Seattle. But times have changed over the past 50 years and lots of people are moving to Tacoma because it is more affordable and there are a lot of nice aspects to living there so I am putting aside my lifelong Seattleite judgement of Tacoma. The view of Mt. Rainier is definitely gorgeous here and so much closer than Seattle. We then continued onto Gig Harbor which is more of Nick's stomping grounds. We've been there with Nick a few times and it's such a cute little town. We decided to make reservations at Anthony's restaurant in Gig Harbor which is one of our favorite restaurants but we wanted to get there early so we could walk around the town and see it more close up.

The town is built around it's harbor with hundreds of boats. There are tons of eating places and water activities like renting kayaks or paddle boards, etc. We saw sea lions and even a gondola paddling around. We should have reserved a ride on that for our anniversary! Maybe next year...

This town is the most picturesque place imaginable. They had HGTV's Dream Home here in 2018 and I entered the sweepstakes everyday knowing that Nick and Sachiyo would be moving back soon. I surely wish we would have won that one; and it was right on the water, too. You can view it here. Anyway, we love Gig Harbor and it was fun to end our day with a wonderful dinner at Anthony's with a view of the harbor. We didn't need to travel far to celebrate our 40th but it was still a memorable time enjoying what we have right here in our own Puget Sound backyard.

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

Trader Joe's Gluten-Free Oatmeal, Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip Cookies

I don't have very many gluten-free cookies on my blog because quite frankly, I usually don't like gluten-free. But occasionally, I do find a good recipe and this is one that is from the back of the Trader Joe's oatmeal and it's a good one. My friend brought some over to our house last weekend when Nick and family were here for our birthday celebrations and we all loved them. My friends lives a few blocks away and we walk the neighborhood together on weekends. We can easily go 5 miles in no time, talking non-stop. She loves exploring our neighborhood as much as I do and we discover so many favorite little spots. We even found a property with a horse (or more like a pony, I should say.) The views are always quite lovely, too. Bruce and I had our thirty-ninth wedding anniversary on July 18th and I made a point of walking past the house where we had our wedding reception. I told my friend, "Thirty-nine years ago today, there was a big party g

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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