Papa's BIG Birthday

Well, my mom totally did it this time!! She truly managed to surprise my dad with a 60th birthday party! He thought that we were all going out to eat a prime rib dinner as a special event that a restaurant was doing. It took several seconds after he came into the room full of his friends and family for him to process the whole thing! In fact, in reviewing my pictures this evening, I believe the mouth position of my first photo caught him saying "what the H is going on here!" UMMM, which is actually what he said.

While we didn't eat prime rib, the food was good, the company was plentiful, the entertainment was . . . well, entertaining, and the night went off fabulously! Dad enjoyed visiting with everyone. As a highlight, my brother spent hours putting together pictures from when dad was a toddler until now into a 14 minute slideshow. It was so awesome. Sounds like it took my grandma 2 weeks to find those pictures from his childhood. They got packed away somewhere when they moved to town a few years ago. The old photos were sure fun to watch! Another highlight was the presentation that my ornery uncle Pete put on. He is quite a craftsman of all sorts of things. He put together a John Deere green walker that any old farmer would sell his eyeteeth to have. It had dual headlights (flashlights), blow horns (which were quite loud!!), a basket (to hold his "go juice," and a toilet paper holder (for when the unexpected occurs). Everyone got quite a chuckle out of the whole thing.

Dad also recieved a crutch that had a "boot saver" on it. I was tickled about that, after it was explained to me. The old wooden crutch had a little wooden trough on it that folded out. This was obviously to lay an old "unit" on, so's it wouldn't spill into the boots! EEK. He recieved a very nice book entitled "Sex after 60." I walked by and saw that at his party and thought (in my head, of course) "GROSS!!!" When we got home later that evening, I picked up the book and thumbed thru it, only to find that every single page in the book was BLANK! HAHA, oh the things people think up! He also got quite a few cute, nice, obnoxious, and downright hysterical cards. What a fun time! J and I were even surprised to find a scrumptious birthday cake there for us as well, since it was our REAL birthday Saturday. Then we had to agree with many people how uncanny it is that our birthdays were on the same day, of the same year.

We did have a fun weekend. The kids were tired. The cousins were in bed by the time we got there Friday night. They had a fun day on Saturday tho. The weather was windy, but nice and warm. The little girls enjoyed a ride in the John Deere wagon pulled by Aunt Peanut. I got lots of fun pictures. They all had their hair up in ponies on top of their heads. C sure enjoyed following Taryn and Haley around, now that she can keep up with them. Those girls got some bubble wrap at Papa's party and had a ball dancing on that as they popped. Dylan is sure growing too, and will be as big as they are before we know it!

Haley, Cami, Taryn

The boys rode bikes and played Grandma's computer games. Uncle Chris fired up a movie for them to watch at the birthday bash. They look tired don't they!!

Tristan, Colton, Brady, Grant, Devin

My sister and I enjoyed some time together as we set up a blog for her and then went on a vigorous 3 mile walk in the afternoon. We got halfway done and discovered each of us was trying to keep up with the other's pace!! We laughed about that, and the fact that we made our 3 miles in 35 minutes! We even talked thru the whole walk. . .a couple times I was sure I knew what a chronic lung person felt like!

The guys worked some cattle and then we spent some time all together visiting in the back yard watching the kids.

Was a long trip back home! Always is. J commented today on how long it always takes to get home! Lowe's is looking like spring. Got some pavers to enlarge (slightly) my back patio. We are hoping to get a few dirt moving projects done this week so I can start planting. Our apple trees and grapevines arrived on Friday. With that shipment also came some honeysuckle shrubs, a couple of grasses, and the red-twigged dogwoods. I guess all those will go into my garden to await our construction guy. He is supposed to come out this week to look about pouring J a concrete slab on the north side of his shop, and me a couple new sidewalks on the east side of the house to replace the little rock path which break our ankles every time we step on them (whose STUPID idea were those anyway??) The bushes will go along the east side of the yard to provide a living screen so I can't see the endless sea of dead vehicles. YEAH!

Well, it's nearly Monday. Parent/teacher conferences this week--Heaven help us! M