Happy Birthday, to Me & Everyone Else!

Today was the annual January Birthdays Party at our house. We now have 5 of us (Michael, Lyle, Crispy, me, & Ryan)with birthdays in January in the ever-expanding Zajac clan. When I finally came home from Crispy's party last night at 9:30pm, my poor baby, who had been fine when I left, had a fever running around 104 degrees. He was miserable, and the two of us had a very difficult night, with very minimal sleep. This morning was not much better, and he added a very high-pitched, almost constant scream-cry from the moment we got out of bed, until shortly before the party started. It was tough.

I held my sad little guy all morning (did I mention Bob was at work today until sometime after one?), and Jonny finally "demanded" that he take the baby for a while so I could have a break for my birthday. What a great kid! I took the opportunity to take a shower and bask in the silence without the screaming. It was about as blissful as it would get today! When I came back down, the kids (led by Jonny), had hung a birthday banner they had made, and each handed me a homemade card. It was so very sweet! Soon after, my husband came home with some pretty little flowers in a smiley face mug for my daily dose of Cappuccino(his hopes of turning me into a morning person)....hooray! Reinforcement was here!

Even though I virtually had nothing prepared, we seemed to have a nice get-together, and all the kids enjoyed playing with each other. The sublime part of the evening was going out to the Wildfire restaurant where we also met up with Mary....LADIES ONLY. It was terrific, and the food was wonderful. The steak was just the cure for my headache, and we all sampled their award winning Key Lime pie~ YUM! Back at home, the men ordered pizza for the kids and most everyone, including my dad, played a friendly game of poker. All the kids were happy (and fed!) when we arrived back home which made the dinner even better....no guilt at all was involved. Now that is a difficult thing!

We ended the night with multiple rounds of "Happy Birthday", and candle blowing. Laura stood in for Michael who had to leave after poker to go to hockey practice...it was preparation for her upcoming birthday in a few weeks. While some people passed up the offerings of various cakes, I spared no such self control to indulge in my favorite Marzipan cake from Woullet's Bakery that my mom so faithfully brings me each year. Thanks Mom, that is always the highlight of my year!