Happy 4th Birthday = Tired Mama

Jack turned 4 today!  We started out the day like we normally do, except I told him Happy Birthday before I rolled over to sleep for another half hour while he watched Caillou.  When I woke up again, he didn't have any pants on, or underwear.  I'm pretty sure there isn't an episode where Caillou watches tv half-naked so I guess Jack came up with this one on his own.  When I asked him where his underwear was, he replied, "Daddy said I didn't have to wear them."  I haven't verified if this is true yet.

When I asked Jack how old he was this morning, he said that he wasn't four quite yet but he would be soon.  I think he was either waiting for his presents or cake or something to actually mark the point where he turned four.  I figured mentioning the hour that he was actually born would throw him off even more.  The sad part is that I don't remember exactly what time it was.  It was in the 5pm hour.  Maybe 5:11.  (I remember Casey's (11:47am) although I didn't like the fact that she was born at an odd time on an odd day (17th).  But at least I remember it because of that fact.)

At the urging of my friends, I decided to have a last-minute birthday party for Jack today.  (It was literally a day's notice so I apologize if I didn't invite you.)  Almost everyone's husband was out to sea or on duty, so it was essentially a late-afternoon playgroup with some birthday festivities thrown in.  We originally decided not to do a party because we're going on vacation soon and there will be a lot of Jack-oriented fun then.  However, Jack is at the age where he thinks everyone has a party for their birthday and it's pretty hard to explain to him that he's not having a party.  He nodded his head and said okay, but he was still convinced he was having a party.  I didn't even tell him about this impromptu party and yet he was asking when people were coming over.

For some reason, Jack asked for a Spongebob Squarepants cake for his birthday.  I don't know why he came up with this, because he's never watched the show.  I thought maybe he saw one in the freezer at Dairy Queen last time we were there so I stopped by today to get one.  They didn't have one made already.  So...I went with Plan B and made my own.  It came out pretty well; I used yellow frosting and outlined his face with black icing.  Tugger really liked it too, because she ate it.  Yes, she ate the cake!  I went upstairs to get Casey from her nap and normally Tugger is not skulking around the kitchen in the afternoon so I didn't give it a second thought.  When I came back down, Spongebob's pants were gone.  (Seems to be a recurring theme to this day.)

I wanted to cry.  But I had too much to do to get ready for the party.  I would have made another cake but I had no more eggs.  Thankfully, a friend came to the rescue and bought one for me and I just drew the face on again.  I'm also thankful that Jack at least got to see the original cake before it became dog food.

Jack opened his presents from family at lunchtime.  He got a lot of new Lego sets and I knew that he would want to build them and play with him.  However, that really means I build the sets and then he plays with them.  I wanted to do that for him, but I also had a Spongebob cake to make.  I felt frazzled all afternoon trying to get everything done while building a Lego RV and a Lego tow truck.  And then to have the dog eat all that hard work.  So frustrating.

So, party planning in a day is not a bad way to go about doing things.  Only one day of worrying about everything and trying to get things together but it was a long day for me.

Jack had a great birthday though.  As people were leaving this evening, he said to me, "Thank you for the bestest birthday party ever, Mommy!"  Even a cake-eating dog can't bring you down when you hear that.

Video and pictures to follow tomorrow.

PS  I can't bear to throw the other part of Spongebob cake away so he's going to sit on my counter for the evening.  The high part of the counter so Tugger can't eat the other half of him.

PPS  The dog actually thinks I'm going to play with her right now.  She rarely plays with her toys and yet she's got a chew toy that she keeps rubbing against me.  Not the right day dog!