TODAY was my real birthday!

I think the calendars got it wrong this year. My birthday was definitely not meant to be celebrated on Tuesday, it was today! I had a perfectly lovely day which made up for a very ordinary day on Tuesday (except for the dinner with our friends, which was the best part). Today I was treated to lunch by Val, and Glenda joined us too at 12 noon at The Common, a new cafe in Eltham. When our meals were brought to our table, Val asked if I'd brought my camera. I hadn't, but I wished I had! The Common does not do plain every day food, and everything was worth photographing because it was presented so beautifully. Tasted great too.
Glenda gave me a set of fineline pens and a lovely hessian covered journal for my birthday. Val had made something just for me, but left it behind, much to her dismay! We got back to my place at 2.15 pm and Val stayed for a while to look at my latest artistic scribbles. Just as she was leaving, Melody and Christine arrived to look at some of my linens, so I did quick introductions and we chatted on the doorstep for a few minutes. To my surprise and delight, Mel and Christine brought me a bag of goodies too - a fat quarter with a cute cupcake pattern, another gorgeous journal and a lovely pen to match. We were chatting in the kitchen over tea and cake when the doorbell rang again, and this time it was my friend Sandra with a friend of hers from New Zealand. So they joined us in the kitchen for the chat-and-giggling for a while before they had to leave. Sandra also had a goodies bag with two packs of specialty tea and a bag of scorched almonds (yum).
Ken had gone out by himself for the afternoon, shopping for techno stuff, so we had the house to ourselves. I've promised all the ladies that when my new kitchen is up and running, I'll invite them over for a cocktail party to christen the kitchen...in the course of our conversation we discovered we all like to experiment with cocktails!