A Busy Weekend

We celebrated a birthday at the weekend. Since A was born (with the exception of 2012) we have always had good weather at this time of year...

 Sun sorted and balloons blown-up.

Cake baked & iced. I'm still using the smartie daisy idea for decoration. Well, we like it so why change, and it's easy too.

 Preparing the pudding.

...raspberry and almond tart...

 ...recipe from here. It's the first time I've made something from this book...

 ...and the tart was yummy, I hope the other recipes are as good. To be honest though I was disappointed with the number of recipes in the book as a large section is devoted to ingredients. Not many of the recipes seemed instantly appealing either, so I'm not sure if the book is a keeper at this stage...

We did have other food, not just puddings. It's just that  I'm always in such a hurry (read late and disorganised!) with the main course that photographing it is not a priority. We had chicken stuffed with black pepper boursin mixed with fresh herbs herbs, wrapped in parma ham and coated in parmesan and breadcrumbs, accompanied by broad bean pilaf,  and coriander and garlic bread. All recipes from here, I really like this cook book, it's definitely staying!

 Birthday bling.

 Making a wish.

A view to the garden once the relatives had left. The garden is looking lovely, I've taken lots of photos of it recently but will keep these for another post.

While I was out taking some garden photos I glanced back at the house to see the birthday girl reading one of her new birthday books. She's going to have a couple of friends over for a sleepover later in the month and I'm trying to arrange a little treat for them all too.

Back to the weekend, a local wildlife sanctuary was hosting its annual open day...

 ...aaargh, despite what I've shown in the photos, it was absolutely hoaching with people. I don't like crowds so didn't especially enjoy the visit. The children did though. There were also quite a few stalls, some selling bric-a-brac and I managed to find a few nice items, I'll share another time.

On the way home I attempted to take some photos from the car of the countryside as the hawthorn is looking fabulous just now. The cow parsley is also still blooming and can be seen whizzing past in the forground. I rather liked the effect in the following two photographs...

And I got out for a Sunday evening bike ride. I'll save those photos for another time too...

Edit: just to say I wasn't driving the car at the time I took these photos! I snapped them out the passenger window as hubby was driving, no fancy camera work required.