The Long, Busy Birthday

We started Jack’s fifth birthday very early by attending a fishing derby at a local duck pond. The idea sounded really good. The reality was less than – but only because it was blazing hot by 9 a.m. and every child under 10 in the tri-state area showed up to fish. Jackson’s fishing pole broke on the first cast and he was already grumpy since he didn’t get his usual 14 hours of sleep. Jeremy became disgruntled when he didn’t catch the first fish out of everyone and became further discouraged when he didn’t catch any. Add to the fact that lots of parents were fishing on their child’s behalf (which was against the rules) and fishing etiquette was ignored, we cut our losses and left after an hour and a half. We went home to decompress.

It was good that we went home because we need to rest and revive ourselves for two rounds of bowling. Jackson LOVES TO BOWL. The child can barely lift the five-pound ball and it takes at least three whole minutes for the thing to slowly creep down the lane. But dang it, he LOVES it. (I have videos of him bowling but the lighting was so bad in there that the footage is murky.)

We allowed Jackson to open his gifts one by one throughout the day instead of making him wait until after dinner. After bowling we all sat down to put together his new toys.

Bill and Susan, who had joined us throughout the day, came over for dinner. Since Jackson isn’t a sweets kind of guy, we put candles in his slice of pizza and sang to him that way.

The day was really swell and Jack was happy for about 90 percent of it (he really would’ve preferred to sleep in, God bless him). Even though I miss his infancy like a crazy Mama Bear, he’s turning out to be a pretty cool little kid. He still fits snuggly curled up in my lap, so for now, it’s all good.

error: Please, no copying.