HAPPY DAYS
First of all I want to thank all my blogging friends for making my birthday so special.

The morning of the 18th the wishes started coming in every few minutes and you know what, they are still coming in!! Thank you for your thoughtful, sincere, clever and funny greetings. I've been rereading them and I must say, you bloggers really know how to throw a party and the great thing about it is "there is no cleaning up afterwards."

Between your participation and my going out with friends and family over the weekend, "it's been like a Polish wedding!! It was a great way to start another year and as a few of you have said, "celebrate every day." We should all do that! ;-)

A week before my birthday my friend Nanci and I took a day trip to Portland, Maine with an AARP group. The bus trip was scheduled for August 10. I called Ronni to see if we could meet sometime during the day and what do you know, she was leaving for vacation on the 9th. I was coming into town and she was going to be out of town. Shucks!


One of the first stops we made was at a restaurant in Scarborough (Dunstan School Restaurant) where we had a wonderful buffet lunch. You name it, they had it but I must say my very favorite item was the fried clams!! Dessert wasn't bad either, lemon meringue pie must be a specialty of theirs, it was a mile high!!

The main event of the day was a Duck Tour of Portland and Casco Bay. The tour took us through the main street where the city hall and library are located. What surprised me was how narrow the street is. As we continued on the tour I saw that many of the streets are hilly, I saw some ladies walking in their high heels, the hills didn't faze them one bit. I would find it difficult walking on those streets even with flats!!

We rode by Monument Square which has a weekly farmers market which Ronni visits. She has written about the market and has some great photos of the fresh produce and flowers that are available.

As we got closer to the waterfront I saw some beautiful old mansions and a few high-rise condos.


Then into the water we went, it was a beautiful sunny day, perfect for a ride on the bay. The tour guide told us many facts, some fiction, some non-fiction but entertaining all the same.

All in all it was a great way to spend a summer day!

posted by millie garfield @ 5:12 PM | Permalink | I LOVE COMMENTS >> 12 comments

 
ANOTHER YEAR OLDER
It's that time of year again, another birthday. [ Saturday ] How could a year fly by so fast? It seems like I just turned 81 and here I am at the ripe age of 82.

You notice I didn't say, "the ripe OLD age of 82." I'm starting to feel it, but I don't think or act that way, which at this time in my life is becoming a challenge.

So far so good.

I could have written a long post about my thoughts at this time in my life, but I decided to write about something that I remember happening shortly after I got married. I've always wanted to write about this, so here goes!



My husband and I got married in July, and my birthday was the following month. In honor of that occasion my widowed mother-in-law and single sister-in-law invited us out to celebrate. Aaron always liked to plan "mystery rides" and his family was the same way. I had no clue where we were going.

I remember it was a beautiful summer day, a great day for a drive and dinner out.

Well, they picked us up and it didn't take too long before we arrived at our destination - A BEACH!

My sister-in-law parked the car and opened the trunk. There, lo and behold was a large pot wrapped in newspaper, the pot was blue and white enamel. I remember it like it was yesterday. When the cover was removed there was our dinner, a very hot roast chicken, potatoes and vegetables!

At first I was disappointed that we hadn't gone to some snazzy restaurant, but after having that delicious meal, in the great outdoors, I appreciated the effort and thought they had put into it

It really turned out to be a very special birthday!

Update:
Birthday wishes are coming in from around the web. Read the comments...

Claude from Paris sends in this:



Silver Fox Whispers sends this:


Click to Watch at Jib Jab

Labels: birthday

posted by millie garfield @ 6:05 PM | Permalink | I LOVE COMMENTS >> 56 comments

 
Dinner Doctor: Single Millie, Quick and Easy

Click To Play

My mom is featured over on Nina Simonds' Spices of Life videoblog this week. Nina says:

Thoroughly Modern Millie, one of the oldest online bloggers (and Steve's Mom!), has dinner issues, but they are similar to SO many other people... She wants EASY, DELICIOUS, CONVENIENT and HEALTHY food. Millie admitted that she would love to walk into her house at night and have a magical chef appear and prepare the meal. Dinner Doctor to the rescue!!! ..

Drop by and tell Nina what you think.

posted by Steve Garfield @ 4:29 AM | Permalink | I LOVE COMMENTS >> 10 comments

 
TREES, SHRUBS AND VEGGIES
My husband and I got married in 1957. At that time rentals were as scarce as hen's teeth, if you found something that was available it needed a lot of work and the rent was high. We started house hunting and finally found a three bedroom house that was just built, brand new everything but no grass to speak of, no trees and no shrubs.

We both had been living at home and came to the marriage with practically just the clothes on our backs. We needed lots of essentials to get us started. Money was flying out the window - bedroom furniture, living room furniture, rugs, drapes, radio, TV and on and on!



The house had a high foundation which I was anxious to cover with some tall shrubs but my practical husband had different ideas. He discovered a mail order company that would deliver garden products of various sizes and if not completely satified refund your money or send replacements to your door.

Ok, that sounded good, my husband ordered some shrubs and a twin birch. When the package arrived I couldn't believe my eyes- it contained what looked like STICKS to me. They sent us what we had ordered!!

They were VERY small shrubs and a tiny tree. It took a few years before the shrubs covered the foundation.



In the meantime my husband's interest in gardening increased and he started to plant vegetables. Some of his endeavors paid off and some just never made it to our table.

The most successful crop he had was tomatoes. No matter what kind he grew we always had a successful crop, we couldn't give them away fast enough!

I cooked sauces, soups, put them in salads and gave them to our friends but they still kept coming.



Steve recognized the problem. He had a great idea - he would set up a stand and sell the tomatoes in front of our house! We lived near a bus stop so when the people got off the bus and saw this cute kid selling fresh garden tomatoes, they went like hot cakes.

There came a time when he ran out of tomatoes and had none to sell, well, leave it to Steve, he went into the house and took some out of the refrigerator, that we had purchased at the supermarket!!

"You must satisfy your customer at all costs!!"

posted by millie garfield @ 5:32 PM | Permalink | I LOVE COMMENTS >> 16 comments