JP 33

JP turned 33 on Saturday and we spent a weekend celebrating. JP doesn't like his birthday; this is somewhat related to his parents and his mom's habit of picking a fight with him right before and then not talking to him on his birthday, and also getting older just generally bothers him more than me, but I LOVE birthdays. Everyone's birthday, especially the birthday of my favorite person in the whole wide world, so I made a low-key, but still special and very JP-focused weekend.

On Friday we got a sitter and went to our favorite fancy sushi place that has such an amazing happy hour that we can afford to get JP full on tiny bits of raw fish. Ten (yes, TEN) sushi rolls and an order of crab cakes later (plus two martinis for me and sake for him) and we were happy, full, and still well under $100. Blue Sushi Sake, I love you. And because we had to go to happy hour, we were home in time to tuck in the kids and then have a whole evening of drinking champagne, eating chocolate cake, and watching a movie cuddled on the couch- SO many of JP's favorite things all in one. My ideal night would be going for drinks post-dinner and staying out as late as possible, but being home by 8 is TOTALLY a JP kind of evening.

On Saturday I skipped yoga so JP could go swim and then we did his favorite thing in the whole world- piling the kids in the car and driving somewhere to climb on rocks: enter Dinosaur Valley State Park! 75 minutes in the car and then 3 hours of walking around a riverbed and climbing up rocks that made other people nervous. Perfect!

And there were 113 million year old dinosaur prints that made JP feel young! I totally planned that.

There was also a little park that of course the kids adored even though it was smaller than the one we have in our own backyard. Cora thought the slide was the greatest thing she'd ever seen and kept climbing up it and then sliding down it all on her own. She belly laughed the whole time. It was maybe the best part of the day.

We stopped for a late lunch and a beer at an adorable little house/restaurant in town (or "town") before heading back, where all three kids fell asleep on the drive home. All three! Landon hasn't slept in a car since 2008, though later he insisted he was just pretending.

We transferred Cora to her crib once we got home, and agreeable third baby that she is, she went right back to sleep for 2.5 hours. The big kids went outside to play dinosaur hunt, JP took a birthday nap, and I dragged myself to the kitchen to make his cake. In an enormous act of true love, I made his favorite carrot cake even though I don't have a food processor and had to grate a bag of carrots by hand when I could have been lounging on the couch in a quiet house after walking several miles in a riverbed.

JP woke up, the kids found all the imaginary dinos they could come up with, and we finally woke Cora up to head to dinner while my cake cooled. Margaritas were involved and Cora discovered that refried black beans are maybe the most delicious things EVER (only because she hasn't yet had my carrot cake); it was an excellent meal for everyone.

I failed to flour my cake pans (oops), so I couldn't pry them out to make the layer cake I usually do (for an optimal cake:cream cheese frosting ratio), so I just decorated them and presented them in the baking pans. So fancy!

On Sunday we ran errands- who doesn't love a birthday trip to Costco?- and then JP and the kids did yard work- birthday yard work!- and then after what was actually a really great day, JP and I fed the kids, tucked them in bed, and then ordered Thai food to eat while we watched The Walking Dead. Actually, I insisted we eat the Thai before started watching the zombie show since Pad Thai can be disturbingly brain like, but in any order, we ended out JP's weekend doing his other favorite thing.

Claire being Claire, regardless of circumstance

I have lots of favorite things about JP- what an amazing father he is, how supportive and loving of a partner he is, how freaking good he looks in a swim suit... but my insomnia has returned with a vengeance this past week, so lately my favorite thing is that anytime I'm awake and frustrated at 2 a.m., I can reach out for his hand and in his sleep, he'll immediately curl his fingers around mine and turn towards me and sigh this deep, happy sigh. Insomnia is lonely; JP makes it less so.

Cora was there too, she's totally smiling in the pack behind JP

He's my favorite.