Aaron's Not-So-Great Birthday

Last year, Aaron's birthday was great. This year, it was not-so-great.

The festivities started the night before, on a birthday date. It was SO great to get away for a few hours on a real date. We saw "The Tourist" which ended up being just okay. Definitely entertaining, but since we go to the full-price theater only a few times a year, we try to save those rare occasions for mind-blowing blockbusters and this one didn't fit the bill.

After the show, we went to Tucanos for dinner. To make this part of the story short I'll just say that even though we had reservations, it took us 45 minutes to get seated and then there was a whole lot of drama about Aaron's birthday meal and they weren't going to discount it for us and we ended up waiting to speak to a manager FOREVER and yadda yadda yadda the food was good but it wasn't worth all the shinanigans.

After dinner, we picked up Cleo and took her to Yoda's birthday party. Yes it was a party for dogs...and it was actually pretty great.

On to day two, Aaron's actual birthday. I planned ahead. I was prepared. It didn't matter.

Aaron's fam was coming over for dinner at 5. I had choir at 11 and wouldn't be home till after 4 from church so I knew I had to get started early. In between preparing and cleaning up meals for kids, changing award-winning diapers from Kate's recent viral nastiness, getting kids dressed, and getting myself showered and dressed, I made Aaron's birthday cake, frosting, and prepared the main course for dinner and put it in the fridge. Phew.

During sacrament meeting, Kate had another blow-0ut and wouldn't ya know it I forgot to bring diapers so Aaron had to take her home to change her. Here is our conversation via text message a short while after he left:

Aaron: Cleo ate my birthday cake
Me: Tell me you're joking
Aaron: I'm not, I just beat the crap out of her and put her in the backyard

AAAAAAAH! Oh and as an added bonus, she also got into the trash and spread it throughout the house. Cleo is SUCH a good dog, but even good dogs are still dogs. And since ours is the size of a draft horse, the cake might as well have been on the floor instead of cooling peacefully on the back of the oven. And in case you're thinking the cake was a mix, it wasn't. There was real cocoa in that baby.

Aaron came back to church a little forlorn after cleaning everything (including Kate) up. As church was ending, I remembered that I had a meeting so had to send him home with the kids to start dinner. I instructed him to start the rice ASAP because we only had brown rice left which takes at least an hour to cook.

I got home around 5 and whipped up a new cake. Aaron's fam arrived and the kitchen was a disaster and the rest of the house didn't look that great either. Whatever, at least we had a cake. I got everything together by 5:45 and lifted the lid of the rice to put it on the table...and it wasn't even CLOSE to being done! Seriously? An hour and a half later? So I turned the heat up and we waited. At 6:00 the rice was still crunchy. I was already stressed, but adding hunger into the mix turns me into somewhat of a Mrs. Hyde. Aaron took me quietly aside and suggested I just go to the store and grab some Minute Rice so we could eat this century. Ug. Alright.

I grabbed the keys, hopped in the Corolla and -- yep -- slammed into my mother-in-law's car. That's when the tears came. She was parked right behind me but apparently dark winter nights and urgency-induced tunnel vision don't mix. The kicker is, when she heard I was leaving, Ellen told Aaron she was parked behind me and he said, "better go move your car before Ash hits it."

She came out to find me sobbing in the front seat. When she opened the car door I wailed, "I hit your CAR!" And she just laughed.

Aaron didn't laugh.

There was no crumpling of fenders or anything serious, but we do have a nice little round hole in our bumper from where the screw in Ellen's licence plate punctured it. Nice.

Dejected, I slumped inside and waited for the rice to be done. I had to call my sister and un-invite her family for cake since we probably wouldn't eat it till after bed time. Finally at 6:45 I plated everything up and called everyone to dinner. Only to find out that two of Aaron's siblings had a church activity that evening so Ellen had left to take them to it. Awwwwesome. So we ate with Nate (Aaron's youngest brother) and when Ellen got back, she ate alone.

The bright side? Cake Jr. was delicious.

Finnisms

Me: (Tickling Finn)
Finn: (laughing)
Me: (Keep tickling him for a long time)
Finn: (laughing) Mom... (stops laughing, gets serious)I want you to go clean up some stuff.

*****

Finn: Mom, can we snuggle downstairs?
Me: (Surprised because he has never requested this) Sure! I'll be down in a minute.
Finn: (runs downstairs) Mom, I did everything we need!
(He had got a blanket out, dimmed the lights and put the footrest up on the recliner)

*****

Finn knows the phrase "Can I get a what what?!" and has figured out appropriate times to say it. At dinner one night, he was not eating very well. He did something funny that made Aaron and I laugh so he followed it up with "Can I get a what what?!" and we both said, "No. Eat your food."

*****

Finn: Mom, we're not old right?
Me: No, we're not old.
Finn: Yeah, because old people die.
Me: Well, that's right, but people don't die until they're really really really really old.
Finn: Yeah, like you're phone!
(My phone is super out-dated and falling apart. It's kind of a joke between Aaron and I how crappy it is and I guess Finn picked up on it. Luckily I just finished switching my contacts over to a new phone from my brother so I won't be calling from ghetto-ville much longer!)

*****

Finn: Mom, you're my little firecracker. (phrase that a dad says to his daughter in a story I read him the night before.)

*****

Finn: (looking me straight in the face) Shaloony! (He was being silly, trying to call me a name. He learned this from Toy Story when Woody says to Buzz "Good Riddance Ya Looney!" because it sounds like he says "Good Riddan-Shaloony!)

*****

Finn: (playing with army guys) Mom, what's this thing called? (Referring to the plastic piece that holds the legs together)
Me: Oh, that doesn't really have a name. It's just a piece of plastic to help the army guy stand up.
Finn: Yes it does have a name! It's C-H-I-N-A!