Sunday, April 3, 2011

Byres Family Day

Sometimes you just have to call timeout on the world as it whizzes by.  Today we declared it "Byres Family Day" and did just that.  We had a day to celebrate..... us! Its the last day of Spring Break - the next few months are insanely crazy even for us and my mothers heart and instinct told me to take the day to nurture this gift of family we have been blessed with!

So we started with preparing food...... ha ha ..... coz that is how this family is. Last night as dinner was ready Allan doesn't say "I am dishing up" he says "I am plating dinner"..... and no one bats an eye.  So he was up and marinating lamb before 9am today.

We are marinating lamb because one of the things we are doing as a family today is trying to recreate the wonderful Lebanese meal we had at Habibi's restaurant in Portland.  Much research has been done and all the ingredients were assembled.  Allan is making shwarma lamb, Lindsay is making hummus from scratch and David is making pita bread from scratch.  I did the shopping and put the rice cooker on ;)  Clearly you can see I am indispensable to the whole operation.

Anyway - that's for later..... after the food was prepped and in the fridge we headed over to Dunbar in Vancouver to our old haunt the Cozy Inn Cafe.  We started going there before the beasts were born and we took Lindsay there in her infant car seat many times.  We sometimes make the trek for old times sake and the great and cheap breakfast.  But it was closed.

So we headed over to Broadway to the Sunshine Diner - all 60's themed with enough Elvis stuff to make Lindsay happy (she is a BIG Elvis fan) and enough breakfast offerings to make us all very full.

After breakfast we headed to probably our favourite spot in the City - Granville Island.


If you live here you've been there, if you have visited us we have taken you there.....it never disappoints.
We loaded up with:
hot out of the oven Siegels bagels
chocolate walnut rugelah
fresh skinny asparagus (its in season)
Cauliflower (for cauliflower cheddar soup on Tuesday)
Lettuce
Peppers
Organic Chicken Stock
Paprika
Key Limes (which inspired a dessert of key lime pie made by Lindsay)



We also got two banana holders and a baguette shaper from the kitchen store. Whole other story!

We headed back over the bridge to pick a few items (like a gewurtz to go with the lebanese food) and headed home.

The kitchen was a hive of activity for a couple of hours as the meal came together.


And then we all took a break - I made a couple cards and watch some TV, Allan watched some Battlestar Galactica, David read and Lindsay did some social networking.

Then back to food prep - nothing like a house smelling of baking bread and lamb on the grill. MMMMMM

An amazing meal of epic proportions - a family effort that satisfied in more ways than one.  Making food together as a family is as fun and as connecting as eating it together, maybe more so.  I am so grateful my kids are so into food growing and food prep and food eating!

And then..... and here is a sad confession..... we had to right a terrible parental wrong.  While watching Ace of Cakes the other night the bakery was making a cake for the reunion of the cast of "Back to the Future"........and my children did not know anything about the movie!!! I know - what terrible parental
neglect of their cultural education!  They showed a few clips and the kids were interested and seeing as "Eat, Pray Love" (which I would rather see - ONLY because I have see "BTTF" more than once) is PG 14 - we downloaded (legally) the movie and are now watching it together while eating DELICIOUS Key Lime Pie. Thanks Lindsay Lou!



A perfectly perfect day.  I DO know how lucky I am.

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