Birthday Wishes to Cosette from Back HomeHello Peeps! Today is a very special day - it's Cosette's 13th Birthday. She is officially a teenager today! Wanted to send a special shout out to Cosette from her cousins in New York - "HAPPY BIRTHDAY AND WE LOVE YOU!!" Hope your day is as special as you are!!  This will be a relatively short week since yesterday was a holiday. The girls return to school today after being out for 7 days traveling the southwest through New Mexico. They have not been in the "getting up early" mode and it was no joy getting them up and at 'em today. Truth to be told, I was not a happy camper having to get them up, getting dressed myself and returning to my weekday duties of short-order cook, taxi driver and launderer. I will be returning to the gym today. It's been close to two weeks since I was last in an exercise class, so I'm hoping I'm not in excruciating pain afterwards!  So, speaking of birthdays, I will also be celebrating a birthday this week. I will be turning the big 50 on Thursday. To celebrate I have several things planned for this week, later this month and later this year in the summer! This weekend, Tedd is taking me into the city for an overnight stay at a New York landmark hotel: The Waldorf Astoria. We'll be having dinner at one of renown tv-chef and cookbook author, Lydia Bastianich's restaurants, Saturday night, which I'm so excited about!!! On Sunday, we have tickets to the Food & Wine Festival's "Downhome Country Brunch" with Trisha Yearwood! I'm completely stoked about seeing Ms. Yearwood live. Me and the girls watch her show on the Food Network regularly, so I know I'm in for a real treat. In addition, I actually have 2 "birthday" trips, Florida with my sister Danielle for a sister's birthday celebration. Our birthdays are a week apart, so we have had an on again, off again October trip together through the years. Our last sisters weekend was two years ago in Miami and we actually got stranded there for a few extra days due to Hurricane Sandy's devastating storm. This year, we will probably have a relaxing couple of days in the Boca Raton area, soaking up the sun, eating out and sleeping late!! Lastly, I have a big Birthday trip planned for end June/July to Eastern Europe with Tanya! She will be celebrating a milestone this year as well, so the two of us cousins will have a lot to celebrate as we make our way through the numerous cities and countries on our itinerary!! More on this trip later on. So, in light of the fact that it is also Travelin' Tuesday today, I decided to share a link about celebration your birthday in New York! 10 Places to Celebrate your Next Birthday in NYC I don't know about you, but Sugar Factory sounds like a sweet delight! Join us tomorrow for some "local" travel for Where to Go Wednesdays. Enjoy your day and let's hear it again for Cosette turning 13!!! -E  | Back on the homefront - for my Baby's Birthday!!!Hi everyone! It's Travelin' Tuesday and I just got back from oh so my many miles on this most recent road trip! Yesterday was quite a day. It started with going to Saguaro National Park; which has been on my "list" for quite some time (so glad to finally go!)  Driving to the Park 
 Spiky! It was quite remarkable, literally a forest of Saguaros!!! And these things were sooo tall!   Strike a pose! So much life in this desert. But such a harsh life it must be.. It was nice to get there early in the morning, find some trails, do some nature walks, take lots of pictures, all before it started to get too hot out and all before the park really had many other visitors!   Once we left the park we went for a late breakfast, and ordered some lunch to go. We had another long day on the road (8+hrs) ahead of us. We were going to complete our 3K mile road trip, and still had to get to choir. All by 6:30pm!!! Well, things started off pretty close to schedule, and stayed close to schedule for most of the morning, and once we hit the road I was making some pretty great time out there! And my crew had soon fallen fast asleep!!  That was all until I hit somewhere around Palm Springs - everything came to a complete halt! I was at a stand still on the freeway. (Even though I was at a stand still, my mind was going a million miles a minute! I was mentally working on other future trips...more on this later!!! Stay tuned!) My view was completely blocked by all of the semi trucks (big rigs) that were surrounding me. Some of these truckers really drive WAAAAY too aggressively than should be legal for their size! Anyhow, after waiting for several minutes, (I would've turned the car off, except that it was over 90 degrees out there), we finally started moving again. UGH...more time to make up and to shave off of the GPS scheduled arrival time! Well, for the next couple of hours, we hit delay after delay, after delay. But I somehow managed to get us to choir in time (kids had rehearsal and I had a board meeting)! We headed home afterwards, and all got a bunch of warm welcomes from the family! And now, back to today...it's October 14th, 2014 - my dear sweet Cosette's 13th birthday!!! She is just excited to turn 13 today, and I am so happy for her and thrilled when either of my kids are so happy! *But I also can't believe that I now have 2 teenagers! SAY WHAT?!?!  The plans for today aren't too crazy - she'll go for a horseback riding lesson, open gifts, have cake, celebrate with the family, and put me to work in the kitchen!!! These kids of mine really take advantage of my cooking talents! They seriously make a complete menu for me to tackle on each of their birthdays (they think they live in a restaurant!) I'm definitely not complaining, I'm so happy that they love food and love my cooking! So no matter how old they are, if they want to put me to work in the kitchen - I will happily put my apron on and get to work! Cosette had originally wanted to visit Magic Mountain (Six Flags) for her birthday, but after realizing that it wasn't open during the week during the Fall season, along with a few other factors, she decided that she'd like to go to a Murder Mystery Dinner! Being that they don't offer these mid-week, we will be planning this event to continue celebrating her birthday over the weekend!! Well, the time has come for me to get cracking, I've got lots to do, and I still haven't even wrapped Cosette's gifts! Tootles for Tuesday. See ya tomorrow! -T  |
