Happy Birthday, Mr. Richie!

Well, the mango didn't ripen fast enough to eat yesterday, so here I sit smelling it's foul-ness again today.  Such a horrible smell.

Today is the Mr.'s birthday.  He's 31, yes, I am a year older.  I'm okay with that.  I mean, I have to be, he rubs it in my face about weekly, through-out the year.  I just say that I'm that much more cultured, heck, I took my first step on the day he popped into this world.  Heck yeah, I'm waaaaay ahead of the game here.  So you just go ahead and bring it up one more time, Mr.  :)

Ignore my messy house.

He chose to get to open his presents last night rather than this morning (which is a good thing cause I over slept and barely got to see him out the door).  I got him a nice wallet (which I'm pretty sure he doesn't like, or I should say, he won't use).  His current wallet is falling apart.  I think he's had it since he was like 4, or something.  He keeps a spare key to his truck in it, and mysteriously, it fell out.  Imagine that.  It has holes all over it, huh.  It's time to move on.  So I bought him a really nice, new, non-holey wallet.  I think I'll put some Kinley pictures in it today so that he can slowly make the transition.

Kinley was going to get him a shirt but instead decided on pajama pants (okay, I decided on the jammer pants, Kinley was just along for the ride).  You see, "jammer time" is his thing with Kinley.  Every.single.night for the past year (well, maybe not in the newborn months) him and Kinley do "jammer time" where he takes her up, changes her diaper and puts on her jammies.  It's "their thing" and I'm all for it.  We even have a "jammie time" song...."Jammer time, jammer time, it's a jammer, jammer, jammer time...." yeah, we made it up.  It's good, I know.  But we sing it over and over as they go upstairs with her on his shoulders...her smile stretches from ear to ear.  She knows it's their special thing.

So "she" got him jammer pants for their jammer time....and she "wrote" a little card to put inside the box that said "to daddy, for jammer time, love, your jammer girl."  Awwwwww!  Cuteness just oozed from it.  And he loved it.  I think.

She only tasted it once, don't worry, it's non-toxic.

Kinley also made him a homemade card that he absolutely loved and quickly stashed in that top drawer of the dresser, where he keeps all things that make his heart melt.  :)  It's the little things.

Last night we went to Toys R Us to let Kinley spend her birthday money from grandma and grandpa.  She "chose" the Little Tykes Cozy Coupe and then she got a School Bus Monster truck.  It is so cute!  And she loves it, and Lucy HATES it.  Lucy is afraid of everything.  Even baby toys.  And Target sacks.  And boxes.  And trash cans.  And baggies.  As we walked out of Toys R (I don't know how to make the "R" backwards, sorry Toys R Us) we entered a snow globe.  Snow falling everywhere and the parking lot was covered.  It was amazing.  One of those soft snows that makes you want to stretch both arms out and spin around in it.  I really wanted to. But thought that the other Toys R Us shoppers would think that I was strange.  Hmmph.

Today I have major last minute prep to do for our trip south for Kinley's party.  I am making Glass Block Jello, which I intended to be pink and green, but strawberry jello isn't as pink as I thought it would be so now it's Christmas Block Jello.  Oh well, I'm sure it will be just as cool.  I only wish that I had read the recipe before going shopping to realize that I needed 4 boxes of jello and and 2.  So I had to cut the recipe in half.  Oh well.  It's all going to work out.
I'm also going to make some Gooey Butter Cookies.  And again, I wasn't thinking when I bought the ingredients because I wanted to do some pink, some green but I only bought enough stuff for one batch and I don't think I can successfully split the batch to do the two food color colorings.  Catch that?  So we may just have some pink cookies. 

On top of the cooking that I have to do, I have to pack and clean up the house.  I'm always very particular about leaving the house clean.  You just never know.  If something happens to you and you die while traveling, you don't want people to come into your house seeing it as a sty.  They'll think you were a terrible housekeeper.  That's not cool.  So yeah, I always make sure my house is clean when I leave.  And, it's nice to come home to a clean house.  That's a much less morbid excuse to clean before leaving, I guess.

Tomorrow will be filled with rushed hurried-ness.  Picking up balloons, picking up the cake, making sure Kinley gets a good nap early in the day, decorating.....  I also put together a little something to post here in honor of her first year.  So check here tomorrow morning for that.  I've been working on it for over a month.  I'm really excited to show it off.