Best Birthday Ever

Things have been so busy with baby stuff lately that I haven't had time to blog about the BEST birthday EVER! It was a surprise in many ways. Since I was expecting the new baby any day, I really wasn't thinking much about this birthday or expecting much of anything. It was a surprise also because there was an actual surprise party! Let me break it down.
It was a beautiful day, and standing in the sunshine it actually felt almost summer-like. Which is why Will couldn't help running around in nothing but shorts, and play in the water. Growing up I always hoped it would snow on my birthday, but with weather like this I really can't miss the snow too much.
During Will's nap I headed to Hair international to get a much needed update on my highlights. It took a really long time, and I vegged out with a stupid girlie magazine. I came to the conclusion that I will never be in style.
After that my thoughtful husband scheduled a pedicure appointment for my tired, pregnant feet. I got Britton to paint my toenails once during this pregnancy, but other than that they've been pretty neglected. Those are not my toes pictured below... Having 0nly had two pedicures in my life, my feet are nowhere near that cute. But now my toenails are the same color.
Then we went out to eat some Thai food. Lotus Bistro, for those in the area, is really good and kid friendly. They gave Will lots of attention and free ice cream. We of course got my favorite dish, pad thai.
As we pulled into the parking lot at home Will said, "Chris go home Mom." It was just as I thought! Chris must have come over while I was gone to help Britton install some carpet in our downstairs room. Britton admitted that was the surprise. I was totally unprepared when we opened the door to find the new carpet and a room full of people yelling, "Surprise!" A surprise party was a surprise I was totally not expecting this year. (The new carpet is pictured below with the new baby. It's so soft and doesn't show every speck of dirt!)
Our apartment was crowded with friends from school and church, and Britton's family. Britton's parents and little brother Alex even made the trip for my birthday! That was an extra surprise. Plus Margo made her special Texas sheet cake for the event. Yumm!
THEN Britton pulled out an even sweeter surprise. He made a "Renee Quiz" game to do during the party. I don't do well being the center of attention, so this made it easier for me.
Click HERE to open the quiz and enjoy Britton's unique wit. It should open automatically, or a window will pop up and you choose to open it.
Give the quiz a try and let me know how you do:) Margo and Nikki tied for the win at my party with 8 points. Mom, I expect you to get them ALL right. No pressure.

Overall, the day earned Britton one MILLION husband points. He really is the best husband ever.

We've Got Company!

The Scarboroughs have arrived! They actually have been here for a while, but as you can tell, I've been a little behind in my posts. While I wish we could live near my family too, I am so grateful to have Britton's family so close by while Britton finishes up school.
The Scarboroughs add two adults, three cousins, and a dog and cat to the mix so that family get-togethers like Thanksgiving really become a big event!
Will has been happy to spend more time bonding with his cousins. Below, Will and Sam are sharing a "Thomas moment". Anybody who's a friend to Thomas is a friend to Will.

The Scarboroughs moved into a cute house situated right on the edge of the Mt. Diablo wilderness! Their backyard has access to hiking trails, which is pretty rare in the bay area, and we took advantage of a family hike over the Thanksgiving break. It's a beautiful area and I can't wait to explore it more when I'm not so large in the belly.
Phil is working for the same firm as before, and commuting to San Francisco by train. We got to pick him up on his way home one day for a temple trip. Erin met the rest of us at the Oakland temple, and we had a wonderful time together followed by a Denny's run.
It's hard for me to find a picture of Erin because she's usually the one behind the camera. Here's a big group of Olsons celebrating Grandma-lita's 89th birthday! Erin let me borrow a bunch of baby stuff. Score! And she surprised me by driving all the way to Palo Alto for my baby shower.
I probably sound like a broken record, but we really are SO grateful to be able to see our Olson family so often.

Happy Birthday to ME!

Meet Will 2.0. He's faster, smarter, funnier, and better dressed. This year he was completely aware that it was his birthday. He would sing, "Happy birthday to ME!" to anyone who asked. He can also tell you how old he is, but can't tell you his name anymore. If you ask his name he'll tell you, "I'm two!"
This year we stretched out his birthday into two days. We opened presents on his actual birthday and then had a party with cake and ice cream the next day. It was hilarious to see the different reaction to opening the toy presents vs. the clothes presents.



Grandma and Tia were in attendance at Will and Alex's party along with a family from church that we're all friends with.


We decided that Alex and Will might share a birthday, but they don't have to share a cake this year. We made sport-themed cupcakes for Alex representing each sport he plays. His favorite is now tennis! Surprisingly the tennis cupcakes were the only ones eaten. I guess people were afraid of the black frosting.

For Will we designed a Lightening McQueen cake! It was really fun to make, but not the best quality cake I've even made. It included a chocolate cake mix from a box, three Twinkies, two blue M&M's, waxy chocolate-covered donuts, and a whole lot of frosting. But it sure was cute and eaten very quickly. Will was a little sad to see it disappear so fast.

Happy Birthday Britton

His birthday was actually about two weeks ago, but I've forgotten I have a blog lately. Britton's 27th birthday fell on a Friday this year, and despite all my attempts to convince him to have a big party, he was set on watching a movie with me and then getting together with family.
That made planning pretty easy for me. The biggest obstacle was how to wake up in the middle of the night without waking up Britton with some annoying, loud alarm. The answer is so simple! Drink 5 glasses of water before you go to bed. I have no idea how my bladder made it to 3 AM. But I blew up all these balloons and prepped birthday breakfast without Britton making a stir. I didn't realize Britton would probably want to sleep in on his birthday and such late night preparations were totally unnecessary. So Will was the first one to be surprised by the sea of birthday balloons downstairs.
Britton had his usual day at school, except that we met up with him for lunch. Later that night we attended a Chinese New Year party for our courtyard where I made everyone sing to Britton. Then we watched an engineering movie. I'm not kidding! It's called Flash of Genius. It also has some court scenes in there for you lawyer types.
The Olson clan came to our place for our smorgasbord feast of Britton's favorites. Papa Olson made small cable car sandwiches as an appetizer. Grandma-lita made Britton's favorite childhood snack, toasted cinnamon raisin bread with a slice of melted cheddar cheese on top. (Cheese and grapes go together.) Nana Olson made smaller versions of cheesy potatoes and green jello salad. I made a heaping dish of lasagna. Kelsey was also there, but we forgot to ask her to bring some kind of Mexican cookies. Alex sat on Britton's birthday balloons and popped them with a tack.

Notice the thoughtful gifts he received this year.
Hilarius no? It's RoboCut. A haircutting kit that attaches to your vacuum. The pants one is an Easy-fit waistband stretcher.
Ok, the real presents were new Shimano biking shoes from me, and a Havoc Heli and mini RC car from the fam fam.
Finally to finish off Carb-fest 2010, we enjoyed Britton's favorite cinnamon rolls made by our favorite neighbors.
Happy birthday Britton! I love you, you fantastic father, my humorous husband, and best friend.

Happy Birthday to Mummy

For my birthday this year I wanted to keep the tradition of getting a babysitter (Nana) and doing something in the city. We went to the King Tut exhibit this year, and it was awesome! I love all things Egypt. I would love to go there, but I'm kind of scared of terrorist attacks and it costs money and stuff like that. So this is as close as I get to Egypt for now. They make the exhibit feel like you're uncovering the tomb for the first time. One of the most amazing things I learned that I probably should have already known is that by the time King Tut rose to the throne the great pyramids were already over 1,000 years old! Yea, I should have paid more attention in my history class. I learned that the hieroglyph for life is ankh. It was all over the artifacts. And I learned that one of the the young pharaoh's hobbies was hunting for ostriches.
My brother just made a joke about the uncommon toot exhibit. He's always ruining things for me like when I wanted to name my kitten Twinkle he said he was going to call it tinkle. brothers...

On the way home we were passing by Japantown and decided to stop for dinner. Mmmmm. Most of the stores were closed, but we still managed to get dinner, yummy bread, and a delicious ice cream crepe. No funny photo booth pictures this time.

The ice cream crepe comes with a cute teddy bear face.

1st Birthday and Bad Booboos

The time has finally come to celebrate Will's first birthday!! Our chubby baby is stretching out into a pudgy toddler. He's still working on walking, and has taken a few steps and stood by himself once.

Some of his favorite things:
Brushes. His current favorite is the toothbrush. Take it away from him and he will start wailing!
Piggyback rides
yogurt, bread, and strawberries
doggies
attention from adults, but more especially kids

His new favorite toy is the Little People airplane that his Aunt Erin got him. It sings an annoyingly catchy song that Will loves to dance to. As I type this he's pressing the button and waving his arms around.

For the double birthday celebration (Will shares his birthday with his Uncle Alex), the Olson clan rode the carousel and train at Tilden Park.
Like mother, like daughter!
We spent a little time in the sand and surf at an Alameda beach. Not the same as the real beach, but it met the requirements. (sand, warm weather, and not too disgusting water, although Alex did get sick...)
And we wrapped the party up with some more swimming, pizza, and ice cream cake at our place. There's 11 candles for Alex, and one for Will.
As you can guess from the title of the post, life is not all fun and games for the Willster. Yesterday morning I was holding him in the kitchen and he reached out and put his little hand right on the burner. Not even the musical airplane could distract him from screaming.
There's a blister on each finger, but the one shown here is the worst. It's pretty much the size of his finger! It's been over 24 hours and still hasn't popped. Hope no one is eating right now...but any advice for severe blisters?


A note for worriers
Will is fine. After a nap yesterday he was back to his normal, happy self. I'm using antibiotic ointment and band-aids on him.

A Little Late Birthday Ballet

The Nutcracker in San Francisco was fantastic this year! The costumes sparkled all they way from the balcony. Britton didn't want me to get cold so he made sure we sat way up in the highest seats:) Maybe we'll slowly move our way down as the years pass.

To start our evening we enjoyed a dinner at Sauce, a fine restaurant located within walking distance of the ballet. (if using high heels, multiply walking distance by 100.) I had the Hawaiian butterfish wrapped in bacon on a sweet potato risotto cake. mmmmm...bacon. Here's the dashing young husband with adorable dimples. Notice the baby is absent from these pictures. Nana offered to feed him all night again!

We spent the night in The Whitcomb Hotel. Also within walking distance of the ballet. It had this creepy, haunted mansion feeling.

The lobby was a little more cheery.
We stayed in this room.
Sha, I wish! I bet the whole room is made of chocolate!

Happy B-day to Me

How old am I? yellow candles = 10 years, blue = 5 and pink = 1. It was Britton's idea because we were low on candles.
I know the candles are hard to see but since I'm definitely not 16, (although some people still think so...) I must be 26 this year!! This year the Olsons came to party with us, and we went to the creche exhibit. I didn't know what creche meant until I moved here, but as with everything in this area they go BIG or they go home. The exhibit was just as amazing as last year. Then the Olsons made me dinner and we had cake while I opened presents. Britton is taking me to a French restaurant and the Nutcracker next week! (after finals)

I'm always surprised by how much chocolate I get every year! On my mission EVERY person who sent me something sent chocolate...I loved it, but I also learned a very important lesson. If you eat nothing but chocolate in a 24 hour period, you won't have your usual energy to ride your bike around town and climb flights of stairs. I guess it's better in moderation.

Is chocolate my kryptonite? NOOOOOO!