A Simply Wonderful Day

It was my birthday yesterday and I had a wonderful day from start to finish. I woke up to flowers from my hubby who also gave me a gift certificate for an Indian head massage at the newly refurbished Turkish Baths in Harrogate. I opened my other gifts over breakfast: an intriguing book of photographs, "Sitting in China" from Domenica and a lovely earring and necklace set from JoAnn. I went to my book club in the morning where we had a lively discussion of our latest book, "The Fencing Master". I didn't let on that it was my birthday as I didn't want anyone to make a fuss over me. Upon returning home my neighbor called me over, telling me she had a wonderful surprise for me. And wonderful it was: another bouquet of flowers sent by Brenda. Checking my email, I heard from a friend in Germany who I haven't heard from in a long time and it was great to reconnect. Brad said he would take me out to dinner wherever I wanted to go. I chose The Royal Oak Inn in Dacre Banks. I've always wanted to go out to dinner in one of those lovely traditional inns here in Yorkshire and I've heard many nice things about the Royal Oak. The only glitch was that there was a large function going on at the inn that evening and our service was a tad slow. The inn itself was charming and the food good (but not great). We decided to skip dessert because of the slow service, but Brad promised me dessert from Bettys tonight. So I finally got a chance to try out Bettys Banana Toffee Pancakes with ice cream. Scrumptious! And surprisingly light as the pancakes were actually very thin crepes.