Countdown to Weekend o' Birthday Parties

Today I cleaned my kitchen counters. I'd show you before and after pictures, but you'd call social services on me and probably the health department. Satisfy yourself with this: I have FREE COUNTER SPACE!!!

There are still crayons tossed about the living room floor. And blocks. And a couple of Blue dolls. Oh, and 30 trains and trucks. But they're next in my cross-hairs.

I made sausage cheese balls and peanut butter cookies. The sausage cheese balls are for the parties. The peanut butter cookies are for binging. (No, they're not on the recall list. I checked.)

I remembered that I don't have Rotel. W-M was sold out of it.

SOLD OUT OF ROTEL. I know, the world is coming to an end.

So, I made a grocery list. I've decided that the country blue dish drainer rack and water-catching-thingy are history and will be replaced TOMORROW!

Laundry is caught up, but Sissy failed to fold and put away the socks and towels. So, I still have 2 baskets to deal with. Oh, and when The Mighty Hunter returns there will be more (MORE!!!) clothes to wash.

The joy that this thought brings me is indescribable.

How do you spell "indescribable"?

I don't have wrapping paper. How can I have 2 children born within 5 days of each other and not have wrapping paper for their gifts? I have 3 lbs of sausage and 3 lbs of Velveeta. Wrapping paper? On the list.

I removed from my wall 2 hideous decorative baskets that have hung there forever. I did not hang them there. They were there when we moved in, and I haven't had the chance/guts/will/desperate urge to remove them until tonight. Also, an ugly wooden duck decorative towel holder that hung over my kitchen sink is gone.

I'm a rebel, y'all.

Sissy's birthday gift added to our already enviously-beautiful living room furniture collection. A purple bean-bag gaming chair.

If our house is burglarized, I'll know that it was one of you two readers, coming after that bean-bag chair. (I'm watching you.)

Tomorrow, I will go with a friend who is looking for his first job out of high school (he's here till he deploys to Afghanistan in November). I know a mechanic in the area that would allow for him an introduction and possibly an interview and HOPEFULLY a job. Pray for him, please.

After that fun, I will dash to the store to get Rotel and a dish drainer rack and water-catching-thingy and milk. Then I will make sure that the balloons are ordered and get the decorations gathered and the floors vacuumed and the sheets on the guest bed changed.

Did I mention that we will have over-night guests in the middle of the Weekend O' Birthday Parties? Of course, we will. What else would you expect from us?

Friday is Sissy's school birthday party, too. At noon, I will report to the lunchroom and pick up the school dietician-approved and federal lunchroom-standards-meeting still cold from thawing chocolate cake, bags of chips and bottles of water. I will bark orders to The Mighty Hunter to either push Lucky in the stroller or tote the cake to the classroom (at the end of the last hall) and smile! and hurry! and hush!

Friday morning I will pick up both birthday cakes from the home of the lady who is making them. I have tried for 7 years to get her to make Sissy's cakes but never managed to call her early enough. This year, I will just have to try to find her house.

I will also cook My Mom's Microwaved Meatballs (with a cheat, because I use frozen meatballs and put them in the crockpot), and rotel cheese dip and little weenies and something else I can't think of at this moment. All to take to the party that night.

We will hang Christmas lights and sparkly banners and tape balloons everywhere and set out toy microphones (farewell Club Libby Lu! thanks for the closeouts!) and stay out of the karaoke guy's way and move tables and set up chairs into rows (because "a concert has row seats, Mommy. You know, front row, next to front row, behind that row and way back there row.")

So, if you miss me around here, over the next few days, just know that somehow I also plan on doing Lucky's 2nd birthday slide show and post pictures of both parties. So, I'll be back.

Unless I party myself to death.

Which is a calculated possibility. Call the insurance company and increase my life insurance.