She Made It

More specifically, Ainsley let her make it.

After 366 days (stoopit leap year), we were able to celebrate the second "December 16th" in Erin's life, complete with Mimaa and Grandpa support and just a silly number of presents, including a doll from Japan, books from Indiana, and a spoon from West Virginia. Let alone an uncle from England.

We kept the celebration going all week, with Ainsley's parents Tuesday, Tim on Wednesday, and adding Grandad for birthday cake #2 at the Boivins'. Good excuse to take leave for a week.

Tim was actually a late arrival Tuesday night, but since it was 3am his time, we let him sleep in rather than come over for breakfast at 5:30 when our household rattles the cribcage and shakes the collars. We instead met him and Dad down in Occoquan to mail last-minute packages, look at ducks (since it's the sign Erin knows) and eat lunch at the granola-esque Blue Arbor Cafe.

It's very weird to have kids around my brother. I mean, it's just odd to Be A Father, when he knew me as a punk-ass 9-year-old being a dork reading Archie comics eating Ho-Hos by the handful. Hard to explain.

Thursday we picked up to-go manhole platters of hummus and shish so the Boivins wouldn't have to cook for us Yet Again, allowing us more time to hang out and open Erin's multitude of overly generous gifts (including a Metallica lullaby CD which I have no idea how it appeared on Erin's amazon.com wish list). The Boivins were also nice enough to sequester the dogs downstairs, so Ryan was a lot more relaxed and himself, meaning we had to yell at him a lot more often to not be so rambunctious around the delicate Christmas tree ornaments. Ainsley had made a second (!) birthday cake for the occasion, a double-layer affair with kid's blocks all around it, "E", "L" and "G" at the top. I would seriously like to know where she finds the time.

I also don't know how we're going to explain to our children that most kids only have one birthday every year.