CRAIGS 49th BIRTHDAY

the man of the hour

Craig and Daniel

a Guest, seems to always be at these family events...*sigh*

craig enjoying his standard celebratory dinner, STEAK, with a side of APPLES and a POTATO

daniels standard dinner, a BURGER with BACON on it, and "no stuff" with a side of fries.

paris bought his own dinner. a BURGER, with allot of ranch...

my dinner: SEASONED TALAPIA with a side of  SEASONED VEGGIES and Steamed BROCCOLI.

daniel and paris having a conversation...

craig chose NOT to have deseet, mainly because he was filled with dinner...so he let daniel have the dessert hed have gotten, an APPLE something, topped with a scoop of VANILLA ICE CREAM and drizzled in CARAMEL

of course that meant that paris also HAD to have his own dessert, he opted for a cheesecake.
folks, let me tell you, that was the LARGEST slice of cheesecake i had ever seen, period! hard to tell in the pic, but it looked like it was an 8oz piece, seriously.

GIFT GIVING TIME! sorry about the bag they were in, it was what was handy at the moment, lol

THOMAS THE TANK ENGINE..towel. this man LOVEs trains, so it was fitting for him to have this for a gift.

craig fancies himself a kind of HIPPIE, mostly just for the tie-died stuff, and the music...so when i found these towels, i HAD to get them for him..

MORE GIFTS!

PENS! the man NEVER goes WITHOUT making sure he has a pen in his pocket, a true nerd, except he DOESNT have the pocket protector...lol (im working on that one,,lol)

PURPLE (his fav color) NOT BOOKS the size of his pockets.
one of my pet peeves about my wonderful husband is, the fact he carries around a buch of loose papers torn to the size of his pocket to write notes on as he needs to. THATS not the pet peeve, its associated tho.
when craig bends over with that massive  bunch of papers in his pockets, they ALL fall out and...scatter, and it takes craig a minute or two to gather them all up...frustrates me.
so, this was a gift  out of frustration for watching the happles smess over and over and over again...
USE THEM HONEY! i dont want too see those silly loose papers falling and blowing and getting wet anymore...

mans an eagle scout, and he also, never goes without a flashlight in his pocket. PURPLE at that!

he also, can juggle! my hubby is versitaile, lol...
so, i found these  balls, thought, well he collects them, hers some more.
ENJOY HONEY!

MICHELLE

MORE BIRTHDAY GIFTS FOR DANIEL

we had to wait till the paycheck dropped, the day after daniels birthday to go buy these items he wanted.
PAINTBALL GEAR.

a HALO hopper (feeds the paintballs electronically into the gun) and an EMPIRE backpack...

DANIEL GETS A HAIRCUT

DANIELS 17TH BIRTHDAY

its getting harder and harder to get the kid something when half of what hed like he always gets before the holiday.

as soon as ones done (christmas OR Birthday) im on the hunt for more items to try to surprise him with for the next vent 6 months down the road,
this year he asked for, and showed us, what items hed want for clothing,

we had decided after much debate and watching the kid, that wed go ahead and get another xbox360.
this one, however would be purchased over time, for one reason, it helps to build a credit score for us, and it wouldnt cost an arm and a leg out of our pocket to do it at one time, and the kid seemed sencier about not abusing the rights he has on the system. so we took a giant leap of faith on him, and got him another new system.
he had no clue.

so, finally the day comes (july 29) for us to celebate his birthday..he was very casual about it, not really talking much, not inquiring about gifts, not asking if we were gonna do anything.
and i told him we were gonna go out to celebrate.

daniel hates the "show" of any pubic event...hates to participate, hates the fact  i take pictures..im not really sure why. (very much my mother, she wanst into all that either)
anyway, we had  decided wed go cheap someplace to do this, we hadnt bee to burger king in forever, and we decided wed got there, piled danile and the gifts (that were all in the back seat with him) in the car, and started on our journey.

when we pulled up in the parking lot of the establishment, daniel had a cow, and walked off, just left! refused to do the opening of gifts, or anything like that in any restaruant.
so, we had to take everything from the place back into the car, drive down the road and go get him, he was walking home!

when we convincd him to get in the car, i asked him what hed want to do, which i had been asking and all i got was it doesnt matter" as a response.
his answer this time was..go home and do this..
to which i told him hed have to clean up the living room because i didnt want to have a messy room in the pictures.
we got home...
he started cleaning..
as he was doing that and we were commiserating our defeat for a well meant  celebration, craigs mother calls...
and well, we sued that to our advantage.

went back in the living room, told him his grandmother had resquested we go out to eat , because she had sent us money to celerate with him on , and wanted us to make sure we took pics so she could see them and hat he got on FaceBook..

so, he had a change of heart, decided to go back to Burger King and do the celebration..

so we pile it all back into the car, wth the kid in the back seat, and...head right back out to the same place...

find a spot (no one was there, and i mean..NO ONE!) and proceeded to have the celebrations..
one by one he opened gifts:

seriously NOT feeling the celebration thing

dinner

see that smirk, its cause daniel was like "im never gonna wear this, why did you get it?" simple answer: its all they had we thought youd like for half off if we got another shirt, thats the half off shirt...appreciate!

my sons growing up, has moved primarily from his favorite band ICP (insane Clown Posse) to DubStep artist: DEADMAU5. and with that adjustment he went from the dark shirts to "anything but balck shirts" and this deadmau% shirt was the 1st of all of the rest of them that wasnt black, he didnt get 1 black shirt, or 1 ICP item this birthday.

3 pairs of shorts

graphic tees (white)

see, no smile yet. lol

fake smile, i asked him to smile for the picture

another graphic tee-this one, blue!

MORE shorts, cant say he doesnt have enough now..LOL

folks, THIS was the genuine smile!
i could have sworn with all the time he and that xbox sat in the back seat together hed have noticed it, but he didnt, i knew he didnt when i handed this over and the look of surprise swept over his face, resuting in THIS smile...
he said he didnt know it was there...ill chose to believe him.

now THATS the look of 1 happy kid.
was it so bad daniel? did it make you feel aweful? no. you got o=something you wanted, had to sacrifice a small part of yourself to make others happy.
thats part of life, welcome to 17! it just gets better from here.

MAMMA

MOTHERS DAY 2011

i look forward to the holidays that are just for me. im selfish. i enjoy celebrating me. :)
so, as always MOTHERS DAY rolls around one more time, and i get to go someplace i dont ususally eat at.

since my surgery (gastric, ive had the gastric sleeve) going out has almost become obsolete, and i really do look forward to the moments when i can celebrate, and i even enjoy it more so, when its all about me, like MOTHERS DAY, or my birthday.

we usually got someplace where craig can have a steak, and daniel can have a burger with bacon on it, and i..because of the surgery, have to look for something low car, low fat, low calorie. which is super hard to do when your eating out.

i had searched online for a restaurant that had a selection that would suit my needs since this surgery.
i ended up at LOGANS ROADHOUSE. they have a blackened fish that was reasonable.

these are pictures from that night. ENJOY! MICHELLE

craigs having fun. hes such a good man. i really do have a very good husband. i am blesses to have found him.

Daniel, never likes to have his picture taken, i have to sneak the photo op when i can. here hes involved in his itouch.

and me. happy mothers day michelle. :)

craigs standard dinner at logans: Steak, Potato, and a side of  skillet apples.

my much healthier meal. Grilled slamon, skewer of season veggies: zucchini, tomato, red onion, and a side of mushrooms

Daniels dinner. Burger without the "stuff" on it. and a side of french fries.

Protein is the priority when i eat anymore. so i ate my salmon 1st, which didnt leave allot of room for those sides, and i ended up having to take them home.

daniel got to eat the desert id have gotten if i hadnt had this surgery. he opted for a pudding desert.

onto the gifts!

CARD:

Front of card: "Your obviously the worlds most perfect mom..."

Inside of Card: " How else would i have turned out so good? " 

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY

my reason for this face is because, it was more about daniel (lol) than about me (and it was mothers day, lol)
its all good. i appreciate the card. love it actually. daniel takes great care in finding these moments to reflect on. its too bad he doesnt sign them.

FRONT OF CARD: " Stuff only Boring old parents like us understand"

Date Night: the time parents go out and talk about the kids.
The ones who can drive you the craziest are thos little people you love the most

INSIDE CARD:
That a kiss besides being sweet now has great potential for GROSSING OUT the kids (lol)
That Tag teaming is a great concept in Pro Wrestleing and in kid wrangling
That 'For Better and For Worse" ususally means for worse at 2am in the morning.

MORE INSIDE CARD:
That parenting is the GREATEST ADVENTURE (And Mystery) well ever know....
And its ANYTHING but BORING, with a FUN WONDERFUL WOMAN like you.. (AWWWW!)

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY.

it must run in the family, craig never signs His card either, lol

and with all the expectation of having something truthfully awesome tucked away insode the envelipe, i open it to find it ONLY held the card itself...lol

Mothers Day Swag: 2 'BUBBA" Mugs.

MORE scary movies for my collection!

Logans souvenir : the small bucket the pudding daniel had was in.

daniel enjoying the REAL dessert id have been given had i had the stomach for it. yum!

and the whole reason i even get to celebrate this holiday. the greatest thing that i ever created. i love this kid!

MICHELLE