Category: Birthdays

We’re pretty saturated with birthdays during the months of January and February, heh. Jorgie and Emily’s birthdays are the last 2 for February.

Jorgie usually gives us a list of stuff he wants, even though–out of all the boys–he asks for the least amount of stuff, and usually pretty affordable stuff, too. This year, he didn’t ask for a thing, except cash. When I texted him again a few days before his birthday for ideas, he replied with, “Why don’t we all go to Cracker Barrel?” Such a good kid!

Emily, on the other hand, wanted to do Sky Park (we had a Groupon, woooo!) and she had a small wish list of stuff like Squishies, Chubby Puppies and Shopkins. At the bottom of the list it said, “But I’ll be grateful for anything!” I gotta brag: do we have great kiddos or what??

I met Mary, Emily and Alaethia at Toys R Us the weekend before their birthdays. It was their weekend with the kids but the girls wanted me to tag along, so I obliged of course. Emily chose all her birthday presents and their both made out like bandits.

The day of Jorgie’s birthday (Thursday the 23rd), Jorge and I sit for lunch at Republic of the Rio Grande and he breaks it to me that Jorgie wanted to save his money because he was dating a girl and things were getting serious and he wanted to talk to us. I was shocked, and all these thoughts started spinning in my head. What does he mean “serious”? I had Eenan when I turned 17, so that was the first thought that was swirling in my mind. Jorge assured me it wasn’t anything like that, so that was a relief!

We picked up kiddos all over the place that evening and then picked Mom up and headed to Cracker Barrel. 

We ordered our food after the kids took their “usual” seats.

Then Jorgie pulled Jorge aside and he explained about his girlfriend while they played checkers. Jorge comes back and whispers what happened, and that he wanted to have a talk with me as well. Oh boy.

We eat once allll our food gets there. We had the best service that evening! 

We finish up and Jorge takes Mom and all the other kids home while I take Jaylen and Jorgie with me to the mall. Jaylen had a presentation the next day and needed a full outfit. We had only a few minutes to make it to the mall, but it felt like I coasted over there on autopilot as Jorgie told us about how he feels about this girl…and how he wants to use some of his birthday money to get her a necklace he’d seen. He put his feelings out there and I was proud and relieved that he trusts us enough to pull us aside and talk to us about this. And of course, I gently, but sternly, explained that he may feel like he loves her, but she may not be his last girlfriend, she better not hurt him and vice versa, she needs to be a good girl, about protection (we’d already had that talk several times), and we went on and on. Jaylen and Jorgie got measured for shirts by Mr. Shapiro, whom I’d already met at work. He’s such a sweet, patient man, and helped us even when the doors were closed and the lights were dimmed signalling that the store was about to close the registers. He called in that he still had customers and continued to help us. The boys were happy with their stuff (Jorgie got lucky since it was buy one, get one for a penny) and I couldn’t stop thanking Mr. Shapiro.

We talked again all the way home, and Jaylen was sworn to secrecy. Jorgie continued with trying to convince us to help him purchase this necklace.

Emily’s birthday was Friday the 24th so after a crazy day at work, I escaped for a bit to pick up Emily’s cupcakes and met Mario at her school to have her little cupcake party with her classmates.

Her dad gets to have the kids for 2 hours on their birthday, and she chose to go to the Food Park 😀 . I just so happened to have Karaoke Night that night, so it worked out! Mario arrived with the kids and Jorge arrived with our other kids. And it wasn’t awkward, thank goodness! Emily got to spend time with her friend Danica, who is my co-worker, Ryan’s, little cousin :).

It was a great night, and Emily said it was the best birthday, ever!

We did some things around the house on Saturday, including some errands, like groceries, which Jorgie happily offered to help with. Then we made some dinner and headed to Sky Park. I made the mistake of taking most photos with Snapchat…and my phone was running out of storage space so it didn’t let me save them 🙁 .

That’s all I got! The next day we cleaned and ran more errands and headed to the mall for that necklace. The conditions: he will pay off the remainder by washing the cars…and happily posing for all the photos I deem necessary 🙂 !

I had a long, busy day on Saturday, the 11th of February, what with shopping, Audrey’s birthday party and Rejeana’s baby shower (yes, baby shower! She’s having a baby in March!). 

The girls, of course, didn’t want to leave Audrey’s party (it was quite dramatic. Alaethia quietly went to the bathroom to shed some tears and Emily and all their friends followed to check up on her.  So cute!). Jenny (saint that she is!) offered to keep the girls and take them home with her so I could pick them up later. I thanked her profusely and took Jules with me to the baby shower. He had fun digging into all the snacks Rejeana had available at the party. We stuck around for a bit, even helped tidy up the hall at the end of it, and then we went grocery shopping. Once we were done, I dropped Jules and the groceries off, picked up the girls and headed to Target to get a few more things for Jules’ birthday. *whew*

He had made up his mind: he wanted to go to the zoo for his birthday this year. The big brothers–or should I say, the Meany Bullies–tried convincing the poor thing to ask to go to Cracker Barrel instead, because they didn’t want to walk in the heat the next day. He stuck to his guns and said no: zoo. They even went as far as threatening to kick him out of the room! So when Jules came back and sadly said he wanted to go to Cracker Barrel, Jorge pulled him aside and he said he wanted to go to the zoo, but the boys wouldn’t let him in, so Jorge told them all off 😆 . AND they alllll had to go to the zoo and I told them they had to do it with a happy face for being mean to their little brother!

The house stayed a mess, since I was out and about all day, and Jorge didn’t let me finish the day without hearing it 😡 . Ohhh, no he did not. I made sure to let him know I was not ok with that 👿 .

So we got over it by the morning, had breakfast and packed ourselves into our 2 vehicles (Mom was tagging along, so we *had* to use 2 cars!).

We got a group rate (woo!) and wandered throughout the zoo. It was such a beautiful day!

The petting zoo! The part that makes a the walking worth it!

We stopped at Mcdonald’s for lunch (my, how teenage boys eat!) and then we headed home, where Jules opened his gifts. He asked for Hotwheels and dinos, so we complied 🙂 .

Then it was time to make dinner. Jorgie, Emmos and Justin helped with the lasagna.

And finally, we all gathered around to watch The Walking Dead. Love our family time together!!

Alaethia’s birthday was on the 24th. She was excited to be turning “double digits”. It was during a school night and their dad gets to take them for dinner the evening of their birthdays so we would officially celebrate on the weekend. But I did get out of work early to pick up her cupcakes and drinks to have her little birthday party with her classmates.

Her dad met us there and he surprised her with a giant sloth, balloon and candies. We passed the cupcakes and drinks out and then Aly’s teacher let them go out to the playground. I was on sloth-carrying duty and it was quickly becoming hot out 😆 .

School was out for the day but we waited for Emily to let her know we’d be waiting for her at the library. I gave them book fair money and Alaethia wanted to spend hers (Emily already had earlier). She looked around with Audrey and Maddie and found a Pusheen book. It’s so cute!

We read it while we waited for Emily and then we went home. She couldn’t wait to open her birthday presents.

That totes adorbs Pusheen came from the Wish App! I was thrilled that it arrived much sooner than anticipated. We hung around and the girls played with the new toys until their dad picked them up for dinner. Joked around with the boys a bit before they left, and then I tried finding something to do for 2 hours till the girls returned. Alaethia requested a cheesecake for her birthday, but since she was stuffed from dinner, we opted to wait till Saturday, when we’d celebrate her actual birthday.

Saturday came around and she and Emmos tagged along with me to go grocery shopping (but I’m on to them: I know they went with me to hoodwink me into taking them to Claire’s!).

Alaethia spent some birthday money and we made our way to 5 Below to get Emmos some ear phones since her school ones broke, and I ended up getting Jorge and I some work-out gloves and 5 lb. weights…because having to start working out from square one again has made me realize I’m wimpy and 8 lb. weights kill me 🙁 .
Anyway, so after an exhausting trip to HEB for groceries (and spending wayyyy more than I anticipated *sigh*), I got home, made dinner and then all the kids piled into the truck to go to Sky Park, Alaethia’s request. They all had a blast!

It was a great time and now the other 2 little ones want to do the same thing for their birthdays in February. These months are passing by in a blur!