Birthday Celebration Weekend!

Thanks everyone for your nice birthday wishes, and especially for all the great bean-making advice. I will keep you informed on my beany progress!! :) Ha ha. Wish me luck!

I had a great birthday weekend ... filled with vegan yummies, furry friends, friends & family, sunshine, yoga classes... ahhh! Perfect.

We started off my birthday yesterday with VwaV crepes for breakfast. Musty and his brother ate theirs with syrup, but I love mine with homemade raspberry jam and a squeeze of lemon. YUM. Crepes are so quick & easy & SO GOOD! Musty even helped me make them, which was a sweet thing to do & a definite first. Maybe someday he will make them for me all by himself! :)


Then, in the afternoon we had a patio party with my family and some of my close friends. It was so fun. The sun was out, and our newly done patio was wonderful! Some years I have thrown myself a big party and done all sorts of cooking, but this year I didn't feel like doing that. Instead, I went to the farmers' market in the morning (cool to have farmer's market on my bday!) and just got a bunch of fruit. One of the things I love most about this time of year is the emergence of all the wonderful summer fruits at the market - and really, a raw peach is every bit as tasty as a peach pie & a heck of a lot less work! :) Here is some of what I got:


Robata apricots. Aren't they lovely?



Heirloom tomatoes, garlic, and basil... to make Bruschetta Topping.


Bing and Rainer Cherries... mmmm.


Here's the whole spread... minus the **amazing** strawberry-peach ice cream I made. You'll see that I also got a 1/2 flat of organic strawberries & a plate of peaches. So yummy.


I also made these nice Mango Summer Rolls from VwaV. It was my first time making these, and they were very nice. Musty LOVED them and is demanding an encore. In lieu of a banana leaf, I used a giant collard leaf, and it looked nice.


What's a summer patio party without watermelon?


And lemonade!


Musty surprised me with an amazing & delicious German Chocolate Cake from Black China Bakery. Black China Bakery makes some astronomically great vegan cakes, scones, and other goodies... delicious!

Here's a peek inside!

Today I inaugurated our brand new barbecue (thanks to Musty's brother for assembling it!)... and made myself a veggie burger & some grilled zucchini for lunch. I used this beautiful plate that my great friend Sandy gave me for my birthday yesterday.

It was a really great weekend, and I am feeling so blessed to have so many loving friends, family members, furries, and also bloggie friends around me! I hope you had a great weekend too!