Birthday Weekend!

(Do have some Bar Exam stories, as well as fun with Miss Marry, but Birthday boy first!)

On Saturday morning, we trekked down to Dallas for John's first birthday party. The trip went fine and we tried out the portable DVD player. Interestingly, B was only into it for a little while and I'm not remotely sure we had it attached properly, but it was fine.

We got there early enough to settle in, snack, nap, and help a little before the doings were underway. The decorations were awesome! I particularly loved the giant stuffed animals they had for the jungle theme. It was almost like the party food was picked for me as there were six fun cheeses, chick-fil-a nuggets, awesome strawberries and Cake (among other things of course). The birthday boy seemed to enjoy his cake with a little encouragement and was surrounded by so many family and friends. It is always neat to watch people come together to celebrate a little one and his family. I was particularly excited to get to meet Summer and Kaitlin as I've been sharing their adventures through their blog as well as our pregnancies as we're due about the same time.

It was also one of the first events I've been to with so many kids. Throughout the weekend B, John, Kaedyn and Ethan seemed to get along great and are more and more able to play together which is so neat. (Side observation from Janna-- all the great-grandkids names end in "n" something to think about in our current name game). I've posted pretty much all the pictures I took here rather than editing them down as I know various people are interested in different pictures from the event.

After the big party was over we had family lounge, clean, talk and eat time for the rest of the evening. Very relaxing. Quite a shift to be watching kids TV rather than say sports or movies. I think we all enjoyed it and most of us (other than John's parents and maybe Kaedyn) got a good nights sleep.

I was surprised to walk out to get B in the morning and find strings of 30s on my door. Jamie ina very sweet move for a tired mom had decorated my door and various other places in the house for my birthday the next morning. We had cake, fruit, breakfast and presents. So kind when I know so many other things were swirling around. I really appreciated it.

The rest of my birthday was relatively quiet. We shopped a little and had some pizza before leaving TX. B was so tired that he tried to nap with his blanket on the floor mat at the pizza place and slept most of the way back. At home, I talked to a few people, read and we tried to reclaim the house a bit. I found myself a bit lonely, but otherwise OK with being thirty. Thanks for the birthday wishes and hope you all had a wonderful weekend!