March Birthdays

If I'm going to keep this family blog journal going, I need to start with November 2016 to catch up, but I seriously doubt that time for that will ever come, so I'm just going to post when I feel like it henceforth.  Family, church, ministry, maintaining my health/fitness, work, and other writing venues have scooped up all the time I once allocated to blogging.  And now that I can print my Facebook feed, it has become my new source for family scrapbooking.  So for this private blog, I'll focus primarily on things I would not feel comfortable sharing with my Facebook friends.

March feels like Christmas for our family.  We have family members celebrating birthdays on March 3rd, 7th, 9th, 20th, 19th, 25th, two birthdays on the 29th, and 31st. I should probably also include our bunny whose birthday we also celebrated on March 22nd.  It's non-stop partying around here in March.

We traveled to China for 10 days this month, so that felt like one long festival as well.

Our daughter turned 13 this month.  Her celebration began early when Nana and Pops came up to help her celebrate. They brought her a cookie cake and took her out to eat at Chipolte.

 

They also brought gifts from family and friends from my hometown.

Since her actual birthday was the day before we left for China (when I knew I would be scatterbrained and VERY BUSY packing) and the same day as her basketball team's final celebration party, I had coordinated with the coach and team mom to make it a joint basketball/birthday party.   But I somehow managed to put the ending time of the party as the starting time in my phone calendar, so we arrived right after everyone had left. I had this huge cake to share with all the teammates and family members, and we were catching a flight for China in less than 12 hours.  What a waste.  We were both very disappointed, and I earned the Mommy Fail award for the year.

So we took her out to eat at Moe's (she's apparently into Tex-Mex these days) and opened gifts at home, and I got almost no sleep that night before our early departure the next morning.

Then on the last day of the month, which was our youngest nephew's birthday (on my husband's side), we had a belated birthday party for her which involved dinner at Which Wich, homemade cookie cake (that makes 3 birthday cakes for her 13th not counting the gourmet cupcake just for her) by her mama who has zero artistic talent and minimal domestic skills, shopping at one of the very popular, very large shopping centers nearby that looks "cool at night" in her estimation, makeovers at Ulta, buying matching, obscenely overpriced water bottles/canteens at Omega Sports, teens terrorizing Target, and feasting on more dessert at Smoothie King and Yolo.

Her party idea seemed simple enough in terms of planning, but I felt like I was wrangling toddlers at times and was exhausted by the time it ended...which was much later than I planned because the girls kept calling their parents to tell them to pick them up later. I'm realizing more and more how our ability to control our kids diminishes as they grow older.  They were actually well behaved, but I think the store workers get freaked out anytime a mob of talkative teens walk in. The Ulta staff were afraid these girls might steal something.  They don't know our girls at all.  They would be much more likely to buy all the staff lavish gifts, even if it meant skipping meals just to afford it.

The next birthday within our own family was Muffin's!  She turned three years old.  While we had plenty of cake leftover from our daughter's birthday, she obviously could not eat it, so our daughter made her a muffin shaped, muffin sized, Muffin-safe cake comprised of pellets, lettuce, carrots, hay, and green pepper seeds to look like sprinkles on top.

 

My husband celebrated a birthday on the same day as our youngest nephew on my side. Here is photo of the two birthday boys back in 2011 and a collage of old photos my mother-in-law provided. What a handsome boy and young man my hubby was/is!

I made him a pathetic looking lemon pound cake and served it with icebox lemon pie ice-cream.  As always, he wanted to to go Chili's for dinner.  When we arrived, I realized my son was wearing a silly silkscreen t-shirt with a cat inside a cheeseburger that reads, "Cheese-purrger".  Just as I was telling my son he should wear something nicer than play clothes when we go out to eat, the waitress brought his entree and commented on how well his dinner matched his shirt.  He also noted that his father was also wearing a silkscreen t-shirt.  I lost that debate for sure.

I also wrote my husband a cheesy poem for his birthday but was too embarrassed to share it on Facebook for more than a few minutes, so here it is in a more private setting for our amusement.

Thank you, Lord, for this awesome man.
Whom I met as a result of your sovereign plan.

I was drawn to him when our eyes first met.
On that fateful weekend we will never forget.

I wanted him then, but You told me, "No."
"For you have much to learn and seeds to sow.

When your satisfaction is wholly in Me,
And you know the truth that will set you free, 

Only then can you wed and unite as one.
With eyes ever fixed on your Savior, My Son."

Four years went by, and we stayed far apart.
While the Spirit kept molding me and filling my heart.

I met someone else who I thought I would wed,
I told the sailor, for my hopes for "us" were dead.

But that handsome sailor who I had loved so long.
Suspected I might be completely wrong.

We were meant for each other, it had to be true.
So four more years later, he found me, out of the blue.

I had remained single, and the timing was right.
Now I could wed the one I "loved" at first sight.

As we said our vows, we felt God's pleasure.
The love we've shared since has been beyond measure.

He knows when I'm wrong like he did back then.
And patiently leads me to the truth again.

He treats me far better than I ever expect.
And deserves all my devotion, love & respect.

Happy birthday, beloved!