Sunday 18 May 2014

70TH BIRTHDAY PARTY: IF YOU CAN'T BEAT THEM, JOIN THEM!

Thirty-four of us gathered at our house for a Big Birthday Bash as I turn 70 years of age and Iain turns 75.  We are both wearing well as the Mile-o-meter clicks over another year!  

Here we are on our front door step welcoming Neil Bell in the middle. Christina took the photo. That is Harriet (11 months) I am holding.

Flowers from Dawn and Alastair

The weather held!  In the garden under the gazebo that Iain and Brian erected earlier in the day.  The cover is our second one and was made by Saturn Sails (we are good customers of 40 years) from old sails of Seol na Mara and using the original (disintegrating) cover as a template.

Dawn, left, Iain, then Mairi and me.

Christine MacMillan, John and Harriet.

Mairi and Harriet


As another decade passes what better way to celebrate than with champagne!  Alastair proposed a toast to the Birthday Girl noting that she's "a good vintage"!  


Food (the next day).  I called upon the lovely people at the Wishing Well in Gartness to make some quiches and cakes.  That proved A Good Move; I would do it again.  Reaching the age of 70 means (a) I don't have to prove I can bake especially if they do it better than me (b) I can spend some money making my life easier.  Mairi, Maggie, Ann and Liz contributed food as well.

Lotsa cards!


Indy playing with a much loved battered VW car.  He is lining it up with the card from Maggie and Brian showing a VW van "A Room with a View".


Presents!  A maple tree shrub from Bob and Kate


Alastair and I paid a visit to the Apple store in town and bought a new computer for me (Mac - jet engine of a machine: "Mom... how old is your computer? You could upgrade it ....). Done! 

On the floor below my desk is a collection of bottles brought to the party.



A much appreciated present from Linda Brooks, Dawn's mum, of Ticonderoga pencils flown over with Dawn from Vancouver. Linda is doggie-sitting while Alastair and Dawn and Indy are here.


A present from my next door neighbour and her daughter with Liz A's sesamae seed covered muffins at his feet.  He sits under a bush in the garden and the children occasionally find treats underneath (if they have been good)!


The Bearsden Young Fiddlers gave me some lavendar plants which solved a problem for me as to what to do with pot that I had emptied a couple of weeks ago.


* * * * * * * * *
PRE-PARTY HI-JINX: GRANDMA'S GOT A CAKE WITH A LOT OF CANDLES!


Before the party started at 3 pm I had a plan up my sleeve ... what is called "An Inventure".  (This comes from wee Alastair commenting that he liked to go on "inventures" meaning somewhere with a surprise involved).   The weather was sunny with showers but ... this is the West of Scotland ... you go anyhow - just take an umbrella!)


Not telling anyone where we were going (I could just hear the scoffing and scorn being liberally poured!) we (John, Mairi and their 3 plus Alastair, Dawn and Indy) set off from our house 1.5 hours before the guests were due to arrive.  "Where are we going?"


The Fire Department!
Ishie, 7, Alastair, 6 and Indy 2.5 years


If you have 70 candles to light where else would you do it?!



Indy gets to put his candles in the cake  (M&S chocolate cake mix in my mother's Aluminum rectangular cake tin.  Icing: Betty Crocker's standard which comes in a tub. Perfect!  Transport? Mairi's pram from earlier babies as made into a 'bogey' by Iain.)


"Forget the cake 'n candles, Grandma! We like the fire engines!"


* * * * * * * * *

AND SO TO END


 BEFORE:

An orchid corsage from Dawn and Alastair.  Beautiful!  
It is held on by a magnet!  (No piercing the material on which it is 'pinned'!)



 AFTER:  

The entrance hall.






Thursday 1 May 2014

INDY: MAY DAY

Alastair, Dawn and Indy have arrived and will be with us for 3 weeks.  Indy is going to be 3 in August.  Here are a few photos of him caught when one gets him to pause in his very busy activity! He chatters away and has lots of imaginative play e.g. with Lego.  

Today we going to Glasgow's Lego Store in Buchanan Galleries, city centre (en route to the Apple Store to look at an upgrade for Grandma's computer - ya beauty!)