We celebrated a birthday on Sunday by meeting family for dinner. We didn't want anyone to have to travel three hours for a birthday meal, so we picked a location that was centrally located to all three travel parties. The winner? Seiling, Oklahoma...population 875, according to Wikipedia.

Now I don't know about you, but in my experience towns with only eight hundred and seventy-five people aren't the best travel destination. But a visit to the Seiling Chamber of Commerce website proved there were four restaurants in town...a good start for any get together. Our selections were Heath's Steakhouse, My Way Café, Subway, and Willy's Café.

Follow up:

Heath's sounded like a winner to me, but a quick search revealed that they are only open for a few hours after church on Sunday, and we wouldn't arrive in Seiling until 4 p.m. That left My Way and Willy's...sorry Subway, but we can have you at home.

A few more online clicks, and I found what I was looking for - My Way was open 'til late on Sunday evenings. An online reviewer even rated the place, saying it had pretty good food but a long wait. Sounded great to me.

We arrived about 4:15 p.m., and met another party leaving the restaurant. We were the only people there, but it was an off time. Several other parties arrived while we were eating. My kids asked the waitress if they could recharge their Gameboys in the outlet, and she gave them the go-ahead. That was nice (and made the trip back a lot better).

The ice in the drinks was really nice - tiny little nuggets - but it melted kind of quickly because it was a little warm in there. They have a small salad bar...the lettuce looked a little tired but it ended up tasting good and being crisp enough. There was a lot of variety on the salad bar, even though it was little. My daughter wanted a chicken fried steak, which came with a salad bar trip - her first. She enjoyed a salad of croutons, ham and crackers.

That was one drawback - there was no kids' menu. It wasn't that big of a deal, though, because their prices weren't bad. The chicken fried steak was the lightly breaded kind, not the big crunchy coated kind, and it was about $7 and came with the salad bar, potato choice and Texas toast. My son got a burger and chips, and that was less than $4. The chips were in an individual bag too, which was nice. I was expecting a handful of chips from a big bag. There was enough extra food rolling around that we were able to feed our toddler without ordering a meal for her. The waitress brought us an extra plate and we just picked things off our plates and filled hers.

My burger was cooked really nice - just the way I like it, with the outside charred a bit to make it crunchy. It was obviously a hand-pressed patty and was really flavorful and good.

My husband ordered fried mushrooms and got some sour cream to go with them.

He also had ice cream mixed with strawberry and Oreo cookies. He said in an unimpressed way it was all right (he used to work at Dairy Queen, so he's a Blizzard devotee) but when I looked at it, there were big ol' hunks of cookie in there, and that's what I really like.

The menu is varied, and includes Mexican food, breakfast items, burgers, steaks, seafood...your regular café fare. All prices were reasonable - I suppose you can't gouge your customers if you want to keep business in a town of less than 1,000 people.

Dessert consisted of pie and cinnamon rolls. The cinnamon rolls are big enough for more than one person, if you're having them for dessert or along with other foods.

The waitress looked like a high school kid, but she was super-nice. In addition to the Gameboy blessing, she was quick to refill our drinks and was glad to provide to-go cups at the end of the meal. She gave the kids their drinks in to-go cups with lids at the beginning of the meal, which I appreciated.

The place started to fill up when we were getting ready to leave. The signs on the wall were the main decoration for the restaurant.

The signs were also in the bathrooms...

And over the sink. The signs got wittier as we went along.

I said one negative of My Way Café was lack of a kids' menu...the other, bigger problem was that it was hot in there. It was tolerable, but it wasn't that comfortable. The heat seemed to get worse the longer we were there. I was glad to go and get out of it. It was hot outside, too, but at least there was a breeze.

We asked our waitress which of Seiling's two parks was the best, and she recommended Murray Memorial Park, saying Hammon Park was kind of hard to find, and Murray had better toys anyway.

We didn't ever get to Hammon Park, but I have to agree that Murray has good toys.

The swingset was interesting - old-fashioned and like nothing I'd seen before. The merry-go-round was fun for the kids too - so were the old school teeter totters and climbing toy. But the crowning glory, in my opinion, was the slide.

It was big. It was crazy big. I was a little afraid of it, it was so big. It also looks like the metal would be hot, but it wasn't. The kids (and some of the grown-ups) had a great time sliding down it again and again.

These toys are what the City of Seiling web site refer to as "usual children's play equipment."

There was also tons of room to run around, areas to explore, and a way to walk under a highway bridge. The park bathrooms were equipped with toilet paper and soap, although there weren't any doors on the stalls, so you might want to hire a guard.

We were the only ones using the park at the time; another family arrived as we were leaving and started setting up a birthday party in one the pavillions.

When I return to Seiling, I plan on picking up two geocaches. One is in the downtown area; the other is a mile out of town and is near one of the home sites of Carrie Nation. I also plan to call ahead and schedule a free tour of the Redinger Funeral Home Museum. I actually just found out about the museum, and I'm disappointed the chamber didn't have it on their site. I would have called beforehand if I had only known.

The funeral home is located right next to My Way, on Gary England Blvd. Yes, Seiling is his home town. The England Grocery Store is right there on Main Street, although it is unfortunately closed down, and has been since the year 2000.

If you're so enthralled with Seiling that you want to make a weekend of it, you might want to look into staying in another town. The only motel listed on the chamber site is the Crossroads Motel, and according to several online reviewers, it's not a place you want to go. I figure if someone is so moved by the horror of a place that they take the time to post an online review about it, it's probably pretty bad.

Seiling is a town that on the surface, didn't look like it had much to offer, but when we go again, I'm going to make sure we spend at least a couple of hours there. I plan to go on a different day so I can try out another restaurant. I'd also like to go the My Way again...just not in the summer. Maybe in the fall so it won't get so hot. I hate to think of what it felt like in the kitchen, when it was so warm in the dining area. I also will not be returning to Seiling without a tour of the Redinger museum...and my gps!