Double Digits

This has been EG's most anticipated birthday yet, I think, and that's due mainly to that phrase above: double digits. She turned ten on Thursday, and has ended up with something of a birthday weekend. Birthday weekends, by the way, usually mean quite a bit of work for the mom. How is it that this always happens?

Wednesday night, I baked a cake (yellow, two round layers), and Thursday morning, I frosted it (chocolate buttercream). I also made our family recipe sweet rolls for breakfast, along with scrambled eggs.

After a few false starts (literally - our van would not start and we had to all squish into my parents' van), we made our way to White Water. EG went on nearly every slide there! We saw Smrt Mama and company there, as well. After we left White Water and cleaned ourselves up a bit, we headed to the new Chipotle in our area for lunch. Yum! Then it was back to our house for cake and presents. Spousal Unit and I gave her The Complete Poems of Christina G. Rossetti, which she loved, and a charm bracelet with two charms already on it - a big initial "G," and a "Big Sister" charm. My parents gave her two more charms for the bracelet, as well as a book - Spy vs. Spy.

Then, Spousal Unit and my father spent a few hours fixing the van, which now runs again. Hooray!

The next day, Friday, we headed downtown to the Zoo. This was after baking cupcakes on my part. We rode the train and the carousel, made nice with the animals at the petting zoo, peeked in on various animals, and were saddened at the lack of otter play. We had lunch at Piccadilly (the one with the best fried cod), then dropped off EG's bracelet at the store to have the other two charms added. We had ice cream and went to the bookstore while we waited, then picked up the bracelet. In the evening, I made more buttercream and frosted the cupcakes.

Today started earlier with finishing up the necessary cleaning, decorating a bit, and heading to the farmers' market. I am overjoyed because I am an autumn girl at heart. There were both apples and sweet potatoes at the market today! Bliss. Then FB was off to a friend's birthday party while I finished putting away a few things, vacuumed, and decorated the cupcakes.

EG's family party was this afternoon. MIL was over 30 minutes late, which was more trouble than it sounds, as the first item on the agenda for the party was eating lunch. So I had to keep the beans & taco meat warm for longer than anticipated. Then my aunt acted weird after awhile. I never know why she acts weird. Rapid cycling bipolar? Despite all of these hiccups, EG had a great time. She got a couple of big double-dutch style jumpropes, a fashion design projector, Julie's Bike (American Girl), Julie's Floral Jumpsuit (American Girl), a mood ring, and a digital camera. Almost all of the cupcakes are gone already, too.

Because I was clearing and cleaning for the party, the main rooms of the house (living room, kitchen, and dining room) look fantastic, as does the playroom half of the schoolroom/playroom. The schoolroom half and the bedrooms all look decent. Now if I can only translate that success to the upstairs landing area, the sunroom, the library, and the cupboard under the stairs.

We have a quiet day planned tomorrow for the remainder of the birthday weekend. Then it's back to work on Monday morning! Up this week: Master's Academy orientation and the first meeting of math club.