The final week in July is a doozy that has taken us by storm for the last three years. In 2010 it just so happened that we found ourselves in the hospital having a baby three weeks earlier than we'd planned. We brought our baby girl home on our fourth wedding anniversary and hosted a birthday cookout for Riley the day after that. Are we crazy? Yes. Will it just get crazier each year? Probably so. I always seem to struggle with making both of my favorite people feel special and loved. I gave it my darndest again this year! In addition to Lil Red's birthday dinner and birthday party we had a couple other birthday engagements to attend. Immediately following Hallie's birthday party on Saturday we went across town to my great aunt Coleen's suprise 85th birthday party. Bailey, Spencer, Hallie and I showed up too late to witness the "surprise" part but we did get to see her cut into her cake....
I spotted so many familiar faces that I hadn't seen since I was in grade school. Distant cousins galore and it took awhile to figure out who was who and meet their husbands and children. It took me right back to our family reunion years ago. While I chatted with new faces, Hallie stole every noise blower she could find and marched around tooting her little horns....
"Why weren't these at my party!?!"
She wasn't shy about testing out the toys that were sitting around. Here's a shot of the two birthday girls together....
Most of the party crew had gone straight to the surprise party from our house....
Hallie had Uncle Spence working up a sweat as she insisted on being thrown up high in the air.....
I just love this picture of dad, Kara and Alta with the woman of the hour....
On Sunday morning we lounged around and were very slow to get going. As a result we missed Sunday school so we had plenty of time to get ready. Sunday was our sixth wedding anniversary and I woke up to a beautiful card and mani/pedi gift card from my love. Little did Riley know I had his birthday/anniversary gift hiding in the back closet. We had been making a quick run through Ace Hardware last week when I noticed him eyeing (and drooling) over a very heavy duty power washer. This tool would fall into the category of items he wants but is too cheap to actually purchase himself. So I did the dirty work for him and snuck out last week to buy it. It was a bit of a trick (and a workout) getting it from the car into the closet but I managed and immediately went into "keep it a secret" mode. This was the hard part. The very day I bought it I was already saying things like "babe, are you sure you don't want to open your gift now?!" Ahhh, no self control!! So back to Sunday.....we were sitting there when all of a sudden I said "oh no babe, I forgot to tell you something yesterday. In the busyness of everything I noticed what looked like a water leak in the closet and forgot to tell you about it." Of course this made him jump up immediately and we high-tailed it to the spare bedroom. I opened the closet and pulled my wedding dress off of his gift and pointed into the closet and said "see, it's right there." Sidenote: yes, I covered his gift with my wedding dress because it seems to be something that keeps getting thrown around for the past six years and never preserved like it should be. I thought it was actually very fitting considering it was our anniversary. I almost had the urge to put it on. Lol! So back to the surprise, I keep getting sidetracked here. His mouth opened wide and he looked at me with big eyes! "Babe, where did you get this!?!" SUCCESS!!!!
We made it to church that morning with her new Minnie Mouse cup, lawn mower, and Bandaids on both cheeks, both knees and her left shoulder. So many battle scars from the day before I guess. ;)
After church we met the family at Playa Azul for another birthday celebration. This one was for Luke's 26th birthday!
Hallie was her usual crazy self at lunch and had no plans to sit still to eat. Instead she climbed and climbed and crawled and screamed. She's very good at reminding us why we avoid going out to eat these days.
"But Nanny I'm just not a big fan of sitting down"
Luke rocked the big sombrero quite well and got a spoonful of whipped cream in his face when everyone was done singing....
Somehow little one managed to stop running around like a wild woman and came over to the table begging for some "CAKE!!!".....
This next picture is something I am NOT proud of. This just happened to be the only way we could get her to eat anything. Here she is pretending to be a puppy wanting a "treat"....
Like I said....not proud!
We all watched as Luke opened his big surprise. Katie had wrapped the owner's manual to his new smoker and he couldn't believe it when he opened it. It was hilarious watching his stare at her in disbelief. He was excited to say the least. Naptime was upon us so our trio headed the the car. On the way Hallie spotted a "baby bur" perched on the fence. I have no idea how the baby bird withstood her hollering as she reached for him with excitement.....
The rest of our anniversary was spent being lazy, lazy and more lazy. Nothing special. I think the exhaustion from the day before had finally set in and we were fully content sitting and doing absolutely nothing. Romantic, huh? What can I say?! We are old, tired parents! Our real anniversary celebration begins a week from now when we take off for Vegas!!! So after a very low key anniversary I decided to do something special for Riley on his birthday the following day. I had secured a babysitter in Aunt Ky for the evening and had given Riley specific instructions to be home at 5:30. I was going to take him to Canadian, TX for a yummy dinner at The Cattle Exchange. The plan was simple: secure a babysitter, get in the car, drive there, eat, have fun, come back home. Well folks, it wasn't quite that simple. Here's my story:
I called Riley around 5:30 to make sure he was on his way home. He said he was on his way to the gym and I quickly suggested he skip a workout on his birthday. First of all, because working out shouldn't be legal on your birthday...and second of all because we had plans to leave at 5:30. Lol. So he headed home and gave me a "warning call" to tell me that he was "just around the corner." Holy moly.....the birthday boy thinks I'm planning a surprise party!?!?! That was the only plausible explanation for why he would call to tell me something like that. Being the jokesters that we are, us girls stood by the door and yelled "surprise!!!" as he walked through the door. I was feeling slightly dejected since my dinner plans really didn't compare to a surprise party. Ha! The thought had never even crossed my mind actually but it gives me a good idea about what to do next year for his big 30th birthday! He followed me to his truck outside where I hopped in the driver's seat. This is where things started to go awry. Ya see, we are both control freaks. He cannot stand my driving. And I cannot stand driving with him in the car because he's constantly hitting his imaginary brake and making wincing noises everytime I turn the truck. So you can imagine how long I lasted in the captain's seat. I finally pulled over and let him drive the ship. I told him to steer us toward Shattuck and I'd let him know where we were going from there. Well curiosity killed the cat and he started playing the guessing game. When I told him where we were going I could tell he wasn't totally thrilled with driving that far. Long story short, we ended up at Charlie's in Gage for dinner. Another long story short, they don't serve food on Mondays. Well bummer. At that point it was getting too late to head to Canadian so we turned right around and headed back to Woodward where we decided on Wagg's which ended up being not-so-good food and questionable service. To say I was disappointed would not do the feeling justice. BUT....we had plenty of laughs throughout the ridiculous evening and Riley didn't seem to mind that we'd ended up back in town so I guess it wasn't a complete fail. Back at the house, Kylie and Hal were having a ball. She pushed around her turtle, watched cartoons, took a bath, picked out her favorite hat, went for a bike ride with Kylie and Nanny, and read books with Nanny before bedtime. Just a Hallie kind of night.....
I think our birthday hijinx calls for some extra birthday celebration to be added into our Vegas trip. I don't think we will have any problem managing that!!! Another end of July is in the books and what a time it was. It was one of those weekends when you need a weekend to recover from your weekend. Note to self: plan accordingly next pregnancy to avoid adding another July birthday to the mix.
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