The Tien Times: Birthday Blog

The kids and I each have our birthdays in May. Bam Bam Bam. Done. It seems like a good opportunity to have a yearly check in with highlights and low lights.

My birthday was yesterday. 43. Nothing Extraordinary, perhaps extra-ordinary. This Crazy clown lady showed up at my door with flowers and balloons while I was still in jammies! hehe.

Fran has been a good friend thru the years, and while our lives have taken a little diversion from the daily life (her kids are grown now), she has been faithful to fun!

The rest of the day was spent with my kids, interspersed with texts, calls, packages and Facebook messages from dear ones around the country! Thank you! The kids and I went and spent all their birthday money (ha!) on veggie starts for our garden. I plant in pots, just a few veggie choices for the summer. I bought 3x as many plants this year, hoping we could actually feed our family a salad. I often buy one or two plants, which have nice yield but only as a snack for one person! So after a shocking sticker price (gotta work on those math skills for mom!) we went out for Pizza, met up with a friend for a quick park play date, and then headed home to spend the next 2 hours cultivating those plants. Lucy worked hard to help me most of the time. Henry planted one plant and fussed the rest of the time. Then we went out for a fun dinner with a few friends and enjoyed our time aided by margaritas.

It took until 10pm til I was able to leave all the kids' rooms, and drag my tired self to bed. As I turned off the lights, Tim says "Well, I did get you a present". He is still learning how to celebrate birthdays!! He's a funny one that guy. I love his gift choices. They are cute, funny, quirky but usually sentimental in some way. This year's gift was a small statue of Michaelangelo's David. For real. We went to see the real thing in Italy, (I'm blanking on where it is...forgive me Art History buffs-but it's confusing because there are fake ones in practically every city, including Las Vegas where we also have a picture of us in front of a David). Whatever real museum has the real David, presents him in a jaw dropping, angels singing sort of experience. I think I gasped and perhaps heard angels wings flutter near by! He is magnificent. Anyway, Tim thought a mini statue of David would be sentimental of our most awesome trip ever to Italy, and a "homeschooling tool". It's odd and hilarious and sweet. To round it out, he got "me" a set of 100% copper mugs to drink his (ahem, "our") new favorite drink - a moscow mule. It's vodka and ginger beer and some other stuff like limes. We had a delicious one on the plane to Florida last month, and so now apparently it's our new thing. Enough to buy some special mugs to drink them out of when he makes them. That Tim, always thinking of others!!!!!

So Henry turned 4 last week. I actually feel like he should be 5. He's a giant. He's doing a lot better in life as far as social strength, less emotional meltdowns, advancing in milestones, and showing us his intellectual fortitude. Cutting straight lines and patterns with scissors, writing all of his letters (with a very awkward pen grasp), drawing intricate details on his space shuttles and pirate ships art work. He loves Planes, Planes Fire and Rescue, and Cars. The toys he has of those characters are his best friends. So he says.

We had a space/planet themed party, where I tried my hand at some fondant work. The black was store bought, but the planets were homemade fondant. Not at all like the picture I had as reference! But not exactly a pinterest fail either.

Love my little astronaut!!

Lucy turned 7 and is wrapping up "1st grade" at home. She's still reading a ton. Arts and crafts-queen. Free spirit AND strong willed! She completed a piano competition this month, where she earned 5 1st place ribbons for the 5 categories she entered. To earn a 1st place ribbon you must play correct notes as well as play them musically, considering phrasing, dynamics etc. I wasn't shocked at this, but we are so pleased and proud of her hard work. She has definitely dropped off the passion level about practicing piano. This is her trend. Everything she's tried (soccer, ballet, gymnastics, ice skating) she gets 2-5 sessions in, and decides she doesn't like it anymore. It's "boring". I think she means it gets harder, and she has to work at it, and like most of us we don't want to do that. We had a big talk about our gifts, and when we are given a gift (like an expensive doll) we need to take care of it. And sometimes that means brushing out the tangles, and keeping our room clean so we don't step on and break her accesories. You know the boring stuff, to be able to enjoy the full beauty of the gift. And no, you aren't quitting piano!!

When did she get this old?