Izzy Is Two!

Sauerkraut Here!

Holy fuck! What a week….

I got back from South Dakota on Monday and on Tuesday, I spent a few hours making the wheels and license plates for my nephews birthday cake. On Wednesday, I spent nine hours making cakes and cupcakes for my nephews birthday party and on Thursday, after teaching swim lessons, I drove to Boise, Idaho, in the dark, to celebrate my nephews birthday.

Eating a cupcake.

Here’s the thing, I suck ass when it comes to driving at night. At first the sun was shining in my eyes striping them of their protective layers, then it got dark… To prevent myself from crashing every time a vehicles light met my eyes, I wore my night goggles, but that didn’t prevent me from swerving and slamming on the breaks every time I thought a giant ant was running across the road, or a mouse, or the ghost of a black wolf. Lucky for me I wasn’t speeding… At night the speed limit feels like a ride on a jet plane, so I tend to go a little slower.

When I finally got to Boise, the entire family was awake, I felt bad. I hope they weren’t waiting for me?

The next morning I woke up super early (about 5:30AM) and headed to WinCo (a favorite of mine) to buy some baking supplies. I remember working on my cake but that’s about it. I remember eating yummy potatoes and falling asleep in my nephews room… With my nephew, in his tiny, blue racecar bed while watching Ratatouille.

There was a moment on Friday afternnon when I looked over to find my nephew passed out on the living room floor, face down.   

I believe my thought process was… There are lots of people in this house, which means my nephew won’t go to bed because he wants to be a part of the action and he really needs some sleep… So, I will lay down with him and hopefully he will think the party is in his room and he’ll fall asleep. Instead, I kept dozing off, he stayed awake and when the movie was over I realized he was finally asleep and I should probably make my way to the couch.

Saturday was birthday party day. I was up early to frost cupcakes and assemble Izzy’s birthday gift, a Cozy Coupe. If you don’t know, a Cozy Coupe is a little red and yellow Flintstone car, for kids. I had one when I was little and it was my favorite toy, in fact, I still have it, so I thought he would enjoy one.

My Cozy Coupe

Originally I wanted my brother to assemble the car, but he was distracted with other birthday party tasks, so I gave it a shot. In the end, I’m glad I assembled it myself because it made the gift a little more special and I’d have to say I did a pretty good job… Izzy’s grandpa (who I adore!) only had to help me twice.

I had a hunch that Izzy would like his car, but it was confirmed when he snuck out of the house and came running toward it with his arms out screaming, “car!” Supposedly, when his grandmother took him inside the house he was crying, “my car! My car!”

The party was scheduled to start at Noon, but Izzy’s great grandmother must have missed that memo because she called around 10:30AM to ask why no one was at the party. So, it was around 10:30AM when everyone went bananas and rushed about the house.

When my little sidekick, Gorda and I arrived at the party she told Izzy’s grandpa that I put paper towels in my bra, this is true, my boobs sweat like a whore in church. Luckily, I don’t get embarrassed easily, but I’m sure he was a little taken back. Because I’m awesome, I gave him yet another reason to question my sanity by falling to the ground… I am awesome and I tried to wear tall shoes to a bumpy park.

Immediately my nephew ran to the water so his mom let his get in hoping he would have enough of the lake by the time we did his presents and cake.

When it came time for the presents my nephew opened a gift from some friends of the family and was so in love with his new truck, full of tools, that he didn’t give a shit about the other gifts.

However, when he saw his new car he ran toward it and jumped in. I, actually we, my mom pitched it, got him a jacket, a few new outfits, some camping pajamas and some new sippie cups, with cars on them! He didn’t care, but his mom liked them.

Then it was time for cake! Honestly, I was so excited to present this cake to my nephew because I knew that as soon as I set it on the table, I was done and could take a nice, deep breath.

I stole this photo.

I ran to the house to pick it up, loaded it in the car, carefully drove it to the park and slowly (in flat shoes) walked it to the table. Not gonna lie, even though I spent about 25 hours on the fucking thing I was hoping Izzy would ram his fist into this thing… Sort of like the scene from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Dome where the dude rams his fist into the other dudes chest yanking out his heart… Yes, that’s what I wanted. Moving on…

Overall my nephew liked his cake and that made me feel good. It also made me feel good that the other guests liked the cake; it’s always nice to have your hard work admired. However, Izzy didn’t dig into it until later that night and early Sunday morning.

I love his face in this photo, it's awesome.

Then came a traumatic moment in my life… Toward the end of the party my nephew was standing on the bench of a picnic table when he lost his footing. Right in front of my eyes, at record speed I watched my nephew fall to the ground. I didn’t see him hit the ground, but I heard him hit the ground, and it was loud! Then I heard someone say, “he hit his head!” By this time he was surrounded by people, including his grandpa, who’s an EMT, so I thought it would be best to stay out of the way… So I just sat there crying.

Most of you know I never cry, ever. So, if I cry, it’s usually because I’m really upset, which I was. There was my tiny nephew, who I love more than most anything I know in excruciating pain and I was worthless. I felt so bad, I felt like there was something I could have done to prevent it. Bad auntie, bad auntie! Anyways, my nephew got a nice bump on his head, a scratch on his arm and after a few moments with his mom, he was better… For now, in five years he’ll discover he’s bad at math.

In case I hadn’t embarrassed myself enough this weekend I ended the night in a dark bathroom, on the toilet, barfing up pizza and cake into my nephews bucket bath toy. I’m cool.

I’m not sure why I got sick but I’m willing to bet it was a combination of not enough sleep and the heat. People don’t believe me when I tell them that the heat makes me sick, but it does.

Favorite moments:
- Watching my nephew run toward his new car.
- Wearing his Thomas the Train manties, my nephew dug into his cake with a spoon, flinging cake all over the kitchen.

Notice the chunk of cake flying past his ear.

- When Izzy ripped off a wheel from his cake, shoved it in my face and said, “coo-kie.”
- Holding my favorite old man, Dweedle.

I love this photo because Dweedle looks so awkward, it kills me.

Now it’s time for a pumpkin update… I started out with five pumpkins, now I’m down to four, one died. I have two pumpkins with blooms and one with mini pumpkins… I’m SO excited.

And now it's time for random moments of the week...

- While I was sitting in line at a Sonic drive-thru the fucks in front of me took forever.  That's when I saw the van in front of me tip...  Some fat guy got out and distributed tons of food to his gross children.  Don't bother pulling forward assholes, the rest of us will just wait for you rat bastards!

- This kid passed me on the street when I got home yesterday... Awkward.

Finally, before I left for Boise I wrote chicken nuggets on the grocery list hoping my grandparents would pick some up for me if they went to the store while I was gone. When I got back I looked at the list and I noticed that a new one had been started. I headed downstairs and sure enough, there in the freezer, rested a jumbo bag of chicken nuggets, not just any chicken nuggets, Mickey Mouse chicken nuggets! Could life get anymore exciting? I think not.

That is all.

Sauerkraut 

P.S.  Here's two more cute photos...

He loves watermelon.

When his mother asked him to pose, this is what he came up with.