Birthdays and Other Reasons To Celebrate

I love the start of spring for many reasons. One of them is that it's a time for celebrations at the corporate office. My birthday falls in the last week of March, so right about that time, we schedule a great tradition--our annual employee appreciation breakfast. (Yes, it may be my birthday, but these great employees are a great gift to me all year through. So it's a great time to thank them for their service!) As is our custom, each employee enjoys a great meal of bacon, sausage, strawberries, juice, and of course, pancakes whipped up by Grillmaster David. It's a job he thoroughly enjoys! The management team serves up the fare, and everyone gets to savor great conversation, good music, and a nice meal together. I love it!

We also celebrate EVERYONE'S birthday on the management team with a single, large lunch at the local Cheesecake Factory at about this same time. You should hear us try to sing the birthday song, each to ourselves - it's quite a bit of noise, and something we mercifully spared the other diners from this year. Everybody chooses their favorite dish, and we love taking photos of that perfectly-plated food almost as much as we enjoy digging in. From light salads to juicy steaks, everybody's choice is as unique as they are. The portions are so large, most of the cheesecake ends up in to-go boxes--but I assure you, it doesn't stay there long!

A huge thanks to every staffer at Close To My Heart for making it such a fine company to work for. I respect your loyalty, innovation, and commitment to Consultants and customers so very much--I wouldn't want to do it without you!

And of course, we held a casual and fun Lynton family celebration for my birthday as well. So many parties! I feel very loved. Jared and Ashley took the helm as chefs for the event, with a menu that included chicken enchiladas, fruit salad, beans and rice and the most amazing flourless chocolate cake with chocolate ganache. (If I can get Jared to share the recipe, I'll have to post it, along with others from the meal. Everything was so delicious!) The children played, the adults talked, and I had to think this must be what heaven feels like. I'm truly, truly blessed to enjoy marking another year surrounded by people I love so well!