The BIG 3-0

Months ago I was stumped on what to do for Phil's Birthday this year. Yes, we are both turning 30. Hello. So I set to work planning a surprise. His birthday is not actually until the end of September (30th) so I thought the best way to surprise him would be to plan something in August. It also just so happened that our friends from college, Tim and Karen, would be home from Korea in August as well. Perfect. I knew that I had to be sneaky planning it because the only way to get in touch with Tim and Karen would be email and Phil and I share an email account. Hmmmm. So I called my friend Jenni and told her my idea for the surprise and she got in touch with our Korean friends. I had this picture in my mind of us walking into a restaurant and finding our friends sitting at a table just waiting for us! I knew it would be the best kind of surprise for Phil and the best gift that I could give him. It all came together perfectly and my vision came true!

I am so glad that Jenni captured Phil's moment of realization of surprise. My look is of relief...keeping secrets is stressful. I do not like keeping secrets but this was so worth it! I knew that my funny behavior over the past few days would finally be explainable. I even picked a fight with him and dramatically stormed out of the house just so that I could pick up his cake!

Such lovely and happy faces! A serious sight for the sore eyes. Like coming home!

I had Jenni text me when they were almost to the restaurant (they drove from Lafayette) so that I would know that things were running as planned. I had gotten a call in the afternoon and instead of putting my phone in my pocket, like I had planned, I left it out on the counter and when my phone got the text Phil was standing right there. He said "oh, Jenni sent you a text. Didn't she call you this weekend? You should call her back." I scooped up my phone and left the room murmuring something about "getting back to her later." I was totally acting strange.

At 6:15pm that evening, when I normally would have been putting dinner on the table, Phil said "so really, what ARE we having for dinner?" I said "I don't really feel like cooking now. Let's go out?" I knew that he was not happy about that BUT I knew that he knew that I was going to get my way! I had been trying to hide our food all day so that we would have a reason to go out to eat.

After we were done eating at the restaurant he said "well, do you want to come back to our house? We could stop and get some ice cream or something?" This fully confirmed to me that he really was surprised and had no idea that there was an ice cream cake in the freezer with his name all over it!

My handsome guy who totally deserved this surprise in every way!

This would be an example of "too much birthday"
Luke enjoyed the surprise just as much as Phil!

Luke got a hold of the camera!

Sam is the baby whisperer.

Now just the ladies!
Karen, Jenni, and I

And now one of just the guys but Luke really wanted Karen in the picture so he pushed her in place. It was cracking us up!

Men and boys.
Tim, Sam, Micah, Phil and Luke

Sam and his papoose.

The day after the surprise we left for vacation. We had a very long car ride ahead of us and shortly after we started driving I heard from behind me "Here is the church. This is the steeple. Open the doors and see all the people. Karen taught me that!" He was so proud! Apparently Karen had taught him this little saying and hand motions that both Phil and I know but never showed him before. It was really sweet hearing him say this all on his own and really sweet that Karen taught him that when we were not looking. We LOVE our friends. Thank you Karen!

Here is Luke showing us the steeple on vacation.

And now for some party music. I thought that I recorded the whole song but I guess not. Bummer. We all played "Happy Birthday" on our cheap party favor instruments. Musicians we are!