Birthday Breakfast

Birthday Breakfast.  February is a busy month for our family - we have 7 birthdays to celebrate. My husband's starts the ball rolling and it is non stop party time from there. For his birthday this year we decided to have a breakfast party. Family and friends were invited to our house for a country breakfast at 9:30.  I had found some clipart on the net of roosters and hens which I enlarged on a photocopier and made a sign that said "Country Breakfasts served here", and placed it inside our gate. I glued the pictures of the hens onto pasteboard, cut them out and hid them in the garden beds. I also  printed a menu of the breakfast and placed it on a pin board by the front door.   Inside I had a basket of candy eggs on the table next to a toy chicken, just to carry the theme through. I also had a selection of national and international newspapers, as well as a mock up of a front page that I had made. Our own Special Edition had a few details about Greg's interests and life, a joke horoscope, what happened in the year of his birth etc.  We have a lovely old English style dinner service with game birds on it, so that was on the table in the dining room.  On the door of the bathroom I stuck a picture of a couple of chickens with the sign "Roosters and Hens," to indicate that this was the only bathroom in the place.  Breakfast was a selection of fruit salad and yogurt, pancakes and maple syrup, sausages, bacon and eggs, grilled tomatoes and mushrooms, croissants with a choice of spreads, toast, tea and coffee, all laid out on the kitchen table so people could choose what they wanted. The kitchen was very country style too with blue and white gingham spread over the table ($2 a meter from Spotlight) While breakfast was cooking, people read the papers and chatted about the articles, played darts, strolled around the garden trying to find the mock chickens. It was a leisurely, friendly way to start the day and a wonderful way to celebrate the life of a loved one.  It was such a success that we have now formed a Breakfast Club and will meet for breakfast every 2 months or so!