Happy Birthday! # Mono Monday

I should have blipped my niece H as it was her 15th birthday today but I didn't get a good shot of her. Instead, I've blipped Lottie, recently brushed, asking to be let in as she could hear cutlery being moved in the kitchen!

We all had a lazy, restful morning. J helped me skin, core and slice a pineapple with my new gadget recommended by two blippers. I too can now heartily recommend it (courtesy of Lakeland). We sat down to a decent breakfast together at about 10.30am. I then had a bit of quiet time to myself as L and Co. went out to let J do some skateboarding in the village. P and J then headed home with Lottie while L and I did a brief food shop. He then disappeared off to the pub while I prepared pudding for the evening meal at my brother's. I got a new recipe off the internet - cardamom, mango and lime syllabub.

I went over to Brackley in a heavy thunderstorm for 4pm, in time for H's birthday cake and afternoon tea. Everyone was there, Ph, P, P, H, C, S and Teddy. B joined us later. The chocolate birthday cake was deadly rich and even Teddy managed to get his little hand in the chocolate ganache and shoved it in his mouth before any of us spotted it. He loved it! So far he's only supposed to be on mushed veg, porridge and banana. Whoops!

Ph cooked a roast with the beef from one of D's Belted Galloways and his own veggies from the allotment. Although slightly overcooked, the beef was really tasty especially with his own home grown horseradish. The syllabub went down well too. We had a great catch up and it was nice to get out of the house after several days pretty much spent at home but I was ready to come home at 8.30pm.

I'm not sure I'm really ready to go back to work but after a lovely break I think it will actually be OK.