Flying Through the Air

Michael ate the lemon as well.  
A nice taste after all of that sweetness.

Miranda makes the cakes of all cakes each time there is a birthday.

Today she presented Richard with a strawberry lemon cake.

The taste of lemon was there in the layers.

The sun in her eyes is too much for Betty.

The taste of strawberries was in the icing.

That cake came on a glass pedestal.

I asked Miranda what was the occasion.

The taste is awesome for Betty.

She said that last year she ordered a cake like this from an Italian bakery and it cost $40.

She thought she could save a lot of money if she did it herself. I doubt that this cake could have been purchased as that price.

The decorations included splayed strawberries on top interspersed with lemon twists.

Betty tells everyone not to touch her cake while
she is gone.  When she comes back, it is gone.
She blames Grandpa Chis.  She is wrong.

What was great about the party was that it was a three-course meal.

First came the ketchup potato chips.

Some of the adults wondered what happened to the chips.

Grandma Joan, the favourite!  Grandma Joan

Others knew that those chips were the favourites of the three children and weren’t going to last long.

We play games for the first part of the afternoon.

Grandpa Chris had to get a ladder and get the shuttle cocks down from the roof of the garage.

More sun on the mass of Betty's blonde  hair.

Wild badminton hits and a heavy Chinook wind combined to have the birdies land up there quite often.

We sang “Down By the Bay”.

In our version, in the call and response, the response does not have to have rhyming words.

What is left after everyone has a piece on their plate!

Just getting out an sentence that begins with “Did you ever see a (insert any words) and ends with sitting on a (insert any word)”, the our group feels that the song has been successful.

I brought out my skipping rope and Andrew held one end while I skipped with all of the children until they were breathless and had to take a break.

For the second course of our meal we had the cake which was the sensible thing to do: enjoy it while we were still hungry. Miranda gave us beautiful large slices and when she had finished plating up for all of us, there was still one-half of a cake left. But one slice had us topped up with our day’s quota of sugar.

Strawberry Lemon Cake

Richard had gone to Billy Elliot with his cousin, Lurene, her family and Zoe.

He was home by now and had put some binder with the moose meat and fired up the Bar-B-Q.

I looked over to where Richard was frying the moose burgers.

Betty, on the descent

Betty was at his feet, looking up at him, begging for a ride in the air.

Richard’s children are getting tall and many of the childhood games have to be set aside, not only for their height, but Richard can’t throw a lot of weight through the air.

Betty looked as though she wanted this event to go on forever.

... and the first slice of the cake comes out ...

Betty, on the pick up!

She was crying out, “Again, again”, and Richard was giving her just one more chance.

And then just one more chance past the last chance.

And then a third chance past those last to “last chances”.

... moose burgers ...
Richard says he is tired of wild meat getting a bad wrap!

We made two passes around the circle of people at the party.

On the first pass, we all said something nice about our mothers.

On the second pass we said something nice about the birthday person – the one turning 39.

Afterwards he commented to me, “It feels strange to double my age and see that it is possible that I am half way through my life.

Where did those years go?”

I don't know the answer to that question

Arta

... Alice's version of being in dad's arms ...

... and off to another year's trip around the sun ...

Homemade Hamburger Bun
Spectacular!

...they come in onion flakes, poppy seed and sesame seed flavours ...