Wings (not the Paul McCartney band)

As previously mentioned, we all went to Quaker Steak last night because Aiden is crazy about hot wings. Wonder where he gets that from?

From Aiden birthday

Um, hunny? Little sauce there on your... yeah. There. You got it.

For those of you who know nothing about Quaker Steak, they have about ten trillion choices for sauces. You order wings or ribs and then tell the nice server taking your order how you want your meat.......

um......

er......

"lubed".

Heh. (The official name of the restaurant is Quaker Steak AND LUBE, but that just conjurs up so many things that don't need to be pondered when thinking about food, right? So at our house it's just Quaker Steak.)

Tuesdays are All You Can Shove in Your Gullet Wing Nights. Natch, that's Aiden's favorite night to go to Quaker Steak (did I tell you that this place is purposefully located right beside our local Harley Davidson store? You can get a better feel for the crowd now, right?)

So Aiden orders his usual: basket of kids' wings with fries. They offer Jell-O, applesauce and carrot sticks in lieu of fries, but somehow Jell-O and hot wings just doesn't scream "I'm a MAN!" does it?

From Aiden birthday

Aiden's choice last night? Buckeye BBQ. It's Scoville rating? 5,000. Not too hot, but it's up there. In fact, it's the 3rd hottest sauce offered.

The hottest sauce? The aptly named ATOMIC.

Every.stinkin.time we've gone to eat at Quaker Steak, Aiden has literally BEGGED Stan to order the Atomic wings. Every.stinkin.time we've told him no. For real, y'all, you have to sign a WAIVER to eat those wings. Their Scoville rating? 100,000. Shyeah, right.

Last night we lost all sense of right and wrong (must be the effect of the new administration) and we actually let Aiden try an Atomic wing.

Stan tried it first.

From Aiden birthday

Stan not likey.

Aiden tried it. Barely got his mouth around it. Decided Aiden no likey, either.

From Aiden birthday

And there it sat, poor, abandoned Atomic wing.

From Aiden birthday

And the dream, for Aiden, has died.

But he and his flaming tongue were consoled by ice cream.

Lots and LOTS of ice cream (good thing the birthday kid gets it free!)

As if...

...today wasn't already busy enough...

Lillian and Camryn came into the house with the mail about half an hour ago. I was on the phone with a friend that I haven't talked to in awhile, so I didn't look at the mail until I hung up the phone. I saw a birthday party invitation for Lillian, so I opened it. The party is TODAY. It's currently 11:19 am and the party starts at NOON. The invitation wasn't addressed (just her name was on it) so I assume the neighbor just stuck it in the box late yesterday or early this morning. Good thing the girls checked the box, and that I keep "emergency" gifts on hand. Lillo's upstairs in the playroom picking out a princess dress to wear, and I called the parents to see if it's okay that Camryn chaperones Lillian to the party. I have a crazy lot of stuff to do today, so a party wasn't on my agenda. Usually I get a week or so notice for parties, but I've never gotten a couple of hours notice. Who does that?

Today

Today my name is Rancho Grande, and Lillian wishes to be called Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich. I asked if I can just call her PB&J, and she nixed that idea. I must use the entire name when addressing her.

So my weekend went like this: take care of the sick hubby all day Saturday, leave for a brief trip to Target to buy supplies for Lillian's party, eat a bowl of spicy chili for dinner, wake up at 4:45 on Sunday morning and say hello again to that bowl of spicy chili. Fun.

So hubby and Camryn were in charge of Lillian's birthday party. I was confined to the bed. Hubby enlisted our children to clean the den, back porch, downstairs patio and playground area. Camryn baked the cupcakes and iced them. She planned the games, tried to play them with our young guests ("like herding cats" the hubby said) and took the pictures at the party. Camryn and her dad made an excellent team, and the party went very well (I watched the video). I'm so very grateful that I have such a wonderful husband. Most men would've cancelled the party, but my amazing guy trudged ahead. He even made me fruit salad and went out to Jersey Mike's to get me a sub when I felt like eating again last night. Whatta guy.

Feeling much better today. Surprisingly the house is pretty clean. Hubby finished washing all the sheets that I had in the laundry room, and the dishes in the dishwasher are clean. The den doesn't look like a tornado hit it (like I was expecting). He is a great guy. I can't complain.

I'm looking forward to a great week. Hubby is off from work tomorrow, which always makes for a good (relaxing) day. I think we'll go to Lowe's and get some planters and fall flora for the front porch. I get to go to the pumpkin patch with Aiden's class on Wednesday (and again next week with Quinn's class). Camryn and Aiden have just a half day of school on Friday, so I get to have a Mommy date with them before picking up Quinn & Lillian from school. I love Mommy dates.

Right now I'm concentrating on cleaning off my desk so I can get back to scrapbooking. I finished my Disney album (yea!) and need to get back to work on the kids' albums. I have piles of things on my desk, though, so those need to be purged and organized before I can concentrate on fun things. I can't be creative in the midst of chaos.

And that's all I have to say on this Monday. I hope you have a great week!

Life is just funny...

I love funny. It's true that a day without laughter is a day wasted. I just love to laugh.

Yesterday was my birfday. I turned 35. I don't feel 35, but there it is.

As is custom in our house, the birthday person gets to choose the restaurant for the birthday meal. I just happened to get a coupon from Red Robin for a free birthday burger. I love freebies just about as much as I love funny, so Red Robin was my choice.

Earlier in the day the mister had picked up our children from school and taken them to Target to shop for my presents. They each had every bit of money they had earned in previous weeks, and they were determined to try to spend as little as possible on Mom so they could have some money left over to buy themselves something. Hey, it's the nature of the beast. I totally get that.

When we sat down in the booth, the kids were very eager for me to open my gifts. Judging from the packaging, I thought I was going to make out pretty well in the present department. Little did I know...

I opened the first gift.

Hmmmmmm.....a Mission to Mars Lego set. From Aiden. Curious.

I opened the second gift.

A Star Wars Transformer. From Quinn. I'm seeing a pattern here.

The boys had purchased things for me..... from the dollar spot. The Legos and Transformers were given to me as well, in hopes that I would return them to their purchasers if their behavior warranted such generosity.

Gotcha.

The girls gave me gifts that I did not have to return to them. From Lillian I received a magnetic notepad, and Camryn gave me some bath salts and a some Dove chocolate hearts attached to a stuffed bear (She ate half of the chocolates last night in the car, and I'll probably give her the bear...)

Here is where life gets funny, though. This is the part that made my night.

The gifts were sitting beside me on the booth. The waiter jokingly asked if those were my gifts. I joked back that I loved Legos, and Transformers were way cool.

After the Red Robin and staff sang the birthday song, the waiter brought out the ice cream that birthday celebrants receive. He sat it down in front of Quinn, my 5 year-old.

I started laughing, and I said, "It really is *my* birthday!"

Then I had to explain the Legos and Transformer.

Poor waiter. He was so embarrassed.

I am still smiling about it.

Life is funny.

I love funny.