Recap of the Birthday

I know, I know. You have all been sitting on the edge of your seat to find out how the birthday-day went. :) I finally uploaded and organized the photos (no easy feat since the photo program I know inside out, upside down and backwards has decided to stop working correctly. Grrrr!) so the wait is over!

The kids and I got up early (trust me, early was not my idea but it was hard to resist a certain little girl who popped open her eyes and eagerly asked, as she had for the past two days, "Is TODAY Mom's birthday?" When I said that yes, it was, she hopped up lightning fast and said "Let's go decorate!"

Groan. It was 6:20am. On Sunday.

I knew Kelton was already awake and watching TV so I rolled out of bed and got to work. First we got the cinnamon rolls baking and then we set about decorating the house with birthday banners galore! I took my directions from the kids and put things up where I was told. It was pretty funny to watch them pulling stuff out of the birthday drawer and trying to decide the best place to hang things. (And for those who noticed, yes those were Strawberry Shortcake dressed as a princess plates and napkins. Kaylen was in charge of picking out the theme this year. :) )

Once the living room was properly decked out we got breakfast ready and placed on a tray and then we walked down the hall to where Dakota was sleeping (HA! Just try to sleep through kids trying to decorate and help prepare food. I dare ya!) and "woke" her up singing Happy Birthday.

After the food was consumed and the moms were appropriately plied with coffee, we headed out to the living room to open gifts. Once upon a long ago Dakota and I would take all day to open our gifts. One gift every few hours to make it last. We liked that. A lot. But with kids that went right out the window as I truly think they believe they would die if paper wasn't ripped off every gift immediately. The suspense would do them in, I'm sure of it. So, we open all the gifts in one sitting.

It's funny how the kids are like vultures when it comes to gifts. They kept trying to sneak "accidentally ripping" the paper into the chaos. But we were on to them! :)

After the excitement of the morning was done, we were left wondering what to do. We tossed about a few ideas but finally settled on going to OMSI (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry). The kids and I had never been before and Dakota hadn't been since she was a child so it was very exciting! We ended up purchasing a yearly pass since it wasn't much more than the cost for the four of us to go just the one time. Crazy how that works. But really, I think it's a good thing and now we will have something to do when we just want to get out and do something. And as a plus, unlike the zoo, we can go rain or shine! :)

We had intended to spend only a few hours there and then go have a late lunch at Azteca (Dakota's only request for the day was Mexican food - well, that and calm kids. At least she got the Mexican food. *grin*). Before we knew it, the entire day was gone and it was the dinner hour. Amazing! We did go to Azteca and then came home for cake and ice cream. Well...the kids had cake and ice cream. Dakota and I were way too full to even think about it. We had a small serving hours later though because well...we had to. I think it's a birthday law or something. :)

At OMSI:

It was a great day!! Happy Birthday, Dakota!! Forty-two never looked so good on anyone! :)

But now, the birthday trappings are put away and Dakota is heading into finals. In eight more school days year three will be behind her and she will officially be in her last year of law school. But even better than that, we will have her with us every night after work and all weekend long. It makes us all so happy to think that we won't have to cram all our family time into one day and with the upcoming warm days we are all looking forward to having a great summer.