happy birthday

Steve's birthday was yesterday. We had a fun day. The kids and I drove into Boise to Steve's work and surprised him and took him out to lunch. I was running a little late and I wanted to make sure that Steve didn't leave the office but I also didn't want him to know we were coming so while I drove I had Matt call him to stall for a few minutes till we got there. We were driving right by the airport and Matt told him we were all flying to America and rambled on and on for a while and Steve wondered what in the world Matt was talking about. I thought for sure Steve would figure out we were coming when Matt talked about flying because the airport is so close to Steve's work. But when we showed up at his office a few minutes later he was completely surprised!

I wanted to do something fun for dinner for Steve's birthday too so we pretended our kitchen was a restaurant.

I made up a menu.

Matt dressed up like a waiter with an apron and a towel.

We lit candles and Matt wrapped up the silverware in napkins like they do at restaurants.

I even made made a fancy looking salad that we served on chilled plates!

When Steve got home from work Matt welcomed him to the restaurant and gave him a menu, took his order etc. We all had fun. Matt kept jumping back and forth from being our waiter 'Nick', who spoke without pronouncing his r's very well, to our son Matt eating dinner with us. He would run put his apron on while playing 'Nick' and then take it off when he was Matt. He was so in character - it was really funny. When Matt was himself he would ask "Where's our waiter? Did I just miss him?" He came up with all this on his own too. The only prepping I did was to ask if he wanted to pretend to be a waiter at our pretend restaurant. And as 'Nick' our waiter he was incredibly helpful too - serving, taking away plates, even sweeping up rice off the floor.

Ella was not in the best of spirits - she was incredibly whiny and unhappy for most of the night She had a complete meltdown about every little thing. Maybe she was confused by her brother's antics as waiter "Nick". Who knows. She did cheer up a bit when we sang happy birthday to Steve - she even tried to sing along - so cute! And she was pretty excited to see the candles on the pie - yes that is correct - we (the adults) have decided birthday pie is much more fun than birthday cake.I think Steve had a pretty fun day of surprises! We sure had fun celebrating with him!