O Happy Day!

A wise woman once said, "to understand the heart of man is to understand his stomach".  Okay fine, the wise woman is me and the man is Richard, but that's beside the point.  Anyway, with that in mind, for Richard's birthday I wanted to make his tastebuds happy.  You know a woman loves a man when she considers his tastebuds.
Let us begin with the  menu:

Eggplant Lasagna (his favorite)
Carrot-Potato Mash

Green beans in red wine vinaigrette:

                                      

And Salisbury Steak (This is my 'go-to' recipe, we love it...thank you Pioneer Woman!) I wanted to get him Ribeye steak ($$$) from the local family-run marketplace but we reserve that for only the VERY special occasions, like...when family comes to visit and they pay for the steaks.  Special times like that.

Richard insisted on helping with the salisbury steak. And then Simon insisted on helping him.
                                             

Those onions made quite an impression on their unsuspecting victim.

This wine complemented the meal perfectly! 

Just a lil' dab'll do ya...

Home is where the meat is.

Onto bigger and better things. We waste no time here in the Meloche household.  Dessert is not a thing to be trifled with.

A slice of cake and a glass of Chimay...look at him, he's practically giddy.

Okay, and as for the birthday boy's gifts... I will say we went a little overboard, but ONLY because I didn't buy him a Christmas gift. There, I said it. I'm a horrible wife. Happy, now?

To begin, he received a hand-blown glass dipping pen and ink set. Old school is the new black.

Some manly notecards to go with said pen and ink.  Thank you Art of Manliness. And, for the record, I did warn Richard that having a fancy pen and cards isn't necessarily going to make his handwriting any more legible.

Some chocolate to not share:

A movie he loves:

A tie and couple of pocket squares. Did I mention old school is the new black?

And a rare, unframed, original hand-drawn rendering of never-before-seen monsters and bad guys. Do you have any idea what that piece is worth??

In other news, Augustin turned 7 months and is cutting his first tooth.

Thank you for being born, Papa!