They say it's your birthday! It's my birthday too, yeah!

Since my birthday fell on a Sunday this year, there wasn't really a lot we could do to celebrate. Also, Amira was away until today, so we didn't even have all the kids at home. Rich and I were able to go to a fun lunch outing yesterday, which was a great break from all the drudgery of cleaning and repairing we have had to do the past two weeks. Our kitchen sink vent was leaking out the bricks and through our stairs to the patio, into the girls' room, and there was a pinprick leak in the hot water pipe. This was because of a huge - two feet - blockage in the pipe backing things up. The good news was that we already had almost everything out of the girls' room as we were scouring it and rearranging furniture.

I'm not huge on big deal birthdays for me, anyway, but I still enjoy being wished a happy birthday and doing something fun. Generally, I still make my own cake and dinner, unless there is a special place I want to go, just because I know what I like to eat. This year my gift was that a fantastic restaurant in town was catering that lunch event, and since both the folks putting on the event and the caterers know us and our family, and there were over 500 smoked tri-tip and smoked turkey sandwiches left over, plus tons of cookies, they sent us off with a couple boxes of both. Even our family cannot eat that many sandwiches, however. Rich suggested that they give some to the firefighters, then we took some to the tanker base firefighters and the air traffic controllers and a few of the FBOs on the field. We brought home 42 out of the 108 sandwiches with which they sent us to share with our church family and our family, and to make sure that we had something really tasty that I didn't have to prepare. I'm just hoping that the rest were distributed to other staff from the company hosting the event, and the catering company, rather than thrown away.

It's supposed to be pretty hot this week; the hottest it's been so far this summer. I love the heat, because I am exothermic. I throw heat, and don't conserve it at all, which is why winter is so miserable for me. People are acting like it's some huge heat wave, but it is cooler than, or right around, the temperatures it has been here during this time of year for the past 13 years. It is called summer. What amazes me is that the weather shaman are foretelling that it will cool down a little next week, rather than staying in these temperatures for another week or two, like it normally does. This means that not only are all the fans out, but we are putting in the window air conditioning units tonight. We have three that we put in the living room, utility room, and our bedroom. They really do help keep the upstairs, and the rest of the house, cooler. We don't put them in until the weather shaman predict that we will have more than two days over 100˚ in a row.

In other news, pineapple is going well for Jerome. What a strange sentence. Anyway, he only has a few five more testing cycles before he is either completely back to normal or at least with only one or two more foods he cannot have. We're in the home stretch now. At the end of the year, we should have a better grasp on what his diet will be.

• Sunday
  Breakfast: Creamed Eggs, Toast (Gluten-free for Jerome), Bacon, Strawberries, Milk and Coffee
  Dinner: Smoked Tri-Tip and Smoked Turkey Sandwiches, Salad, Chocolate Chip Cookies, Lemon Cookies and Cowboy Cookies, Black Forest Cake (attempting to make it gluten-free)
• Monday - Feast of Saint James the Apostle
  Breakfast: Breakfast Sausage and Home Fries, Strawberries, Milk and Coffee
  Dinner: Koosa Mahshi (stuffed zucchini), Rice, Harissa, Duqqus, Chopped Salad, Apricots
• Tuesday - Feast of Saint Anne, mother of the Blessed Mother
  Breakfast: Blueberry Scones (Gluten-free for Jerome) with Almond Butter, Cherries, Milk and Coffee
  Dinner: Leftover Muffroom (from freezer) over Rice, Duqqus, Green Salad, Moroccan Orange Honey Cake
• Wednesday
  Breakfast: Scrambled Chickpeas with Onions and Peppers, Oranges, Tea with Honey
  Dinner: Eggplant Gyros with Turkish Flatbreads, Sliced Veggies, Roasted Olives, Cherries
• Thursday
  Breakfast: Yogurt with Blueberries and Cherries, Toast (Gluten-free for Jerome), Milk and Coffee
  Dinner: Pizza Party
• Friday - Feast of Saints Mary and Martha
  Breakfast: Vegetable Hash Burritos with Salsa, Oranges, Tea with Honey
  Dinner: Kusheri, Green Salad, Apricots
• Saturday
  Breakfast: Battatas ou Bayd, Fruit Plate, Milk and Coffee
  Dinner: Beef Stir Fry, Jasmine Rice, Oranges

What is on your menu this week? If you want a recipe, ask and I will provide it as soon as I can. If there are any starred recipes, I will follow up separately with a weekly recipe round up on Saturday.

Labels: Birthday, Family, Governor Inslee Needs a Frozen Fish to the Forehead, Homemaking, Menu Plans, Tales from the Kitchen