It's a rare occasion when my family all gets together. Unfortunately not all of us were together, but over half of us were. Micheal turned 30 and Sarah set up a surprise birthday party for him. He had a surprise with his co workers, which wasn't the true surprise. Actually the true surprise at that party was that Daniel and Katie showed up!! Michael was very happily surprised. But there was more to come.
There was going to be a family surprise party.It was at Katie W's apartment. We had some trouble finding it so we missed the actual surprise. But we didn't know that when we arrived. We were terrified when we parked and Michael parked right next to us. Although we knew it wouldn't help, we froze. Micheal walked up the the drivers door and Dad opened. "I was already surprised." He said. We were extremely relived. He opened my door and I promptly sang him happy birthday. I did my worst possible job at it and he said something along the lines of how he knew I could sing better than that.
When we got there not everyone was there yet. But Trina arrived, Emily and Josh, and Mom and Richard! I don't know if Michael knew if Mom and Richard were coming, but he seemed surprised. I forgot that I had my camera with me when we were actually at the party. All of these pictures were from the next day.
Trina's Daniel, and the kids were not able to make it to the actual part but made it to the just family gathering the next day. Dad had to go home from the surprise party, which was dreadfully sad, but Rosie, John and I got to stay at Michael and Sarah's with mom and Richard. We all slept downstairs on the couches and floor. I was sweetly woken up the next morning with Amanda sitting on my lab. She sat there happily for over an hour, playing and talking to me.
The boys went to a gun show and the girls went to Goodwill. It was so fun shopping with Sarah. She would pull things off the racks and show them to me. I found a couple of really good finds thanks to her suggestions. Melanie and I spent some quality time in the toy aisle also. Needless to say she wasn't to keen on leaving.
The party truly began about 4:30 when family started to arrive. Trina and Daniel came first. Emily and Josh had kidnapped Katie the night before and the arrived next. The house soon got filled with laughter and talking.
Amanda really enjoyed the balloons that were floating around. I gave her one for both hands and her face lite up.
She is such a laid back kid. She just sits there and watches people. She smiles all the time, and loves to cuddle and crawl/walk around.
Are family get togethers consist of a lot of pictures. From selfies to just pictures of us enjoying each other's company.
It also can get loud, but it's a good kind of loud. Not screaming loud, well most of the time not screaming, but laughter loud.
Sarah was going to make taco salad for supper but there was a lot of people and not enough taco salad fixings to go around. So we resorted to pizza. It took about five pizza's to feed us all, so there were leftovers for the next day.
Another part of this was mom reading When Jessie Came Across the Sea. Growing up, we used to check this book out of the library just so my mom would read it to us. With out fail, every time she read it she would cry at the ending. This never made much sense to me, because it was an happy ending. We got to introduce the grandkids to it and some of us kids enjoyed the trip down memory lane.
Making the glass goblets sing was another thing that happened. Daniel started doing it the night before and it continued to the next day. The singing glasses just became a part of the loudness.
Seeing Trina, Daniel and the kids was a treat for everyone, but I was so extremely happy to see them. I was used to seeing them once or twice a week, but times have changed since they moved. I hadn't seen them for over two months!
We also never see Daniel and Katie. hadn't seen them since last summer. We were supposed to see them over Christmas time but they couldn't come.
A huge entertainment for the kids, and the grown-ups was these massive legos. Michael and Sarah got them from Mark and Hillary, and they girls love them. We built and tore down many different structures.
We missed all the family who couldn't make it! It would have been a little more marry with you there! I can't wait for Benjy and Ashley's wedding for some more family time!
Happy Birthday Michael! I hope this year is the best yet!!!
