Birthday Buddies

You know how some years your birthday is just so nice and perfect and other years it just annoys you?  I tend to get my expectations pretty high for life events which of course always sets myself up for disappointment.  Why do I do that? Major personality flaw.  Anyhoo, this year I was just so happy that it was on a Saturday and John-Paul, my birthday buddy, would be home all day with me.  Even better, it wasn't during Lent!  We've had our bday on Ash Wednesday before, so this was a major plus.  We woke up to Phil making hash browns as part of a huge breakfast.

See that handy dandy contraption?  My brother and sister-in-law told us about it last week and we amazon-primed one right up.  It's amazing!

The kids showered us both with homemade cards which just happen to be my very favorite kind.

We gave JP his big gift in the morning..a Fitbit Flex!  Now Phil and I and the three oldest boys all have activity trackers.  We are such a weird family.  Even Declan gets in the car after picking up everyone at school/daycare and says "How was school?  How many steps?" to everyone.  It cracks me up.

We went to morning Mass, I got to go for a nice run, I took the kids to the library, and Phil and I were able to sneak away for lunch with only the baby during Declan's naptime.  It was such a great day.  Phil cooked an amazing meal of our favorite chicken cordon bleu and it was yummers.  We picked the world's best chocolate chip cookies for dessert with ice cream.

Then for some reason, I changed into pajamas before the presents which means all of the following photos are even more embarrassing than they should be.  But, it's a momma's job to document.

My favorite birthday present is 14.  FOURTEEN!

I said to JP "How can you be 14 and I'm still 29?  That means I had you when I was 13!!"  To which everyone laughed at the accountant who can't do math.  

Phil nailed it with the gifts.  He got me a foot roller after I saw it on Madeline's blog.

Andrew's face.

Then, after my parents raved about theirs, he got me a Fire Stick.  You guys, it's so cool.  You just talk into the remote and tell it what show to play and it finds it.  No searching different streaming sites and painfully punching in letters...just say it and it starts.  You can even ask it to play music or what the weather is.  I thought something like this would be super expensive, but it's not!!

And finally, he totally surprised me with a bluetooth Bose speaker.  I always play music from my phone in the kitchen when I'm cooking or cleaning and the kids and I dance around, but now we can actually turn up the volume and really jam!  We've had two major dance parties already and I was thankful nobody lives below us at the moment because they would not have been happy!

Andrew the Ham strikes again.

Now it was JP's turn to open the little gifts...first up a pair of black jeans in size 16.  Sniff sniff, I remember when he was a 2T and they were falling off his tiny waist.  In fact, he wore a lot of overalls as a toddler because he was so long and lean.  He still is, but he can hold up pants now.

Then a lunch bag which Andrew immediately declared as "too girly" and everyone agreed and cracked up at silly mom.  I'll have to get him this one instead.

Finally, a sweatshirt to his new high school next year...

John-Paul, my little James Dean.

Here come the waterworks.  

JP is such a great kid, always nose deep in a big book and lost in his own world, but incredible smart, kind, and easy to be around.  I'm so happy we got to have him lead our pack.  Happy 14th bday buddy.