The Birthday Girl and the Luau

Welcome friends and family! Glad you stopped by! Today is a special day, Shay the baby of the family is turning 12! We celebrated last night with a low key Luau style dinner.

This is where the Birthday Girl will be seated. In pink of course. Her friend Sally the flamingo is sitting in for her.

Even the hula girls were invited. They don't eat much or take up any space.

It's so hard to believe she is 12!

For her dinner she chose Pan seared Parmasean Talapia with Oven Roasted Potatoes and Parmesean Grilled Asparagus.

More Hula-ing going on! Hula-ing? I guess its a word?

The Birthday Girl blowing out her candles....Saying goodbye to 11! (BOOO HOOO!) Slow down child, you only were in diapers yesterday it seems!

I  am linking up with Susan at Between Naps on the Porch for TT. Make sure you stop by and see as many of the tablescapes as you can. They work so hard. The talent and photography blows me away every week! Have a wonderful weekend. School is starting Monday, We will be having our first Freshman in a while and the Birthday Girl will be in 6th.....SIGH!

Garden Update and Other Chit Chat

Hello there bloggy friends. In usual fashion I have been MIA around here. Lots of things have been going on good and bad in the garden around here. First the good, tomatoes are coming in finally and after 3 attempts this season my cantaloupes are full of softball sized melons, my peppers jalapenos and salsa peppers are in high gear. The bad? Yes there is a bad side, over fertilizing on my part caused blossom drop, Late blight came to visit and as soon as that was under control the ugly horn worm went on his eating frenzy.

But things are turning around and the tomatoes plants are again setting blooms and ripening some beautiful fruits. It will probably be a low yield season but with 30 assorted plants I'm sure I will have enough for our use at least.

I have been making tons of jam. My recent batch was Raspberry Strawberry. It turned out SO GOOD! I didn't have enough raspberries to make the batch so I added some strawberries, about a 70:30 ratio. It is perfect, we ate way too much of it last night. I have also made Strawberry Lemon Marmalade, Strawberry Blueberry, Peach and Strawberry Rhubarb.

This is my first Cherokee Purple tomato. They are so beautiful in there own way and the taste is out of this world!

Last but certainly not least the hubby had his birthday this week! We had a super yummy Buttermilk Chocolate cake with White Chocolate Icing. Can you guess how old he was? HeHeHeHeHe.... I'm just being jealous cause I'm four years older.

I am looking forward to catching up on all the blogs I follow I really have missed everyone. So I will stop the chattering and head off to blog stalk everyone! Have a great week friends!!!!!