My Birthday in the Apple Orchard

  

Jeffrey packed his bag for a work trip to Canada the night before my birthday and amid stuffing shirts and trousers and toothpaste into his suitcase, he expressed concern that he would miss my big day.  He has learned well what a birthday means to me! But he didn't have any need to fret, I had a magnificent day (and presents to abate my loneliness at night).

Autumn gave me a perfect day of sunshine and warmth and we headed out to the apple orchard and farmers market for what has yearly become a replacement of my birthday cake: a birthday doughnut. We ran into Mr. Patterson himself at Patterson fruit farm and he is such a kind and thoughtful man, he gave us all our celebratory doughnuts that were made and baked fresh at the farm. Still licking frosting from our fingers, we plunked the babes into a wagon and strolled out to the orchard for slightly-less-sweet treats. My mama, dad, and I tried to pick apples and store them in our bags, but Sawyer and Elouise had different plans and snatched them back out again to stuff in their waiting mouths. Somehow, they still found room for dinner....

After dinner out and presents and bedtime Jeff skyped me to be sure that he hadn't left me alone (thank goodness for our kids and my family) or forgotten. That seemed gift enough, but the next day my favorite surprise arrived in the mail from him, "posted from Canada." Which, quite coincidentally, made it the birthday that kept on giving, my favorite kind of birthday of all.

  

If You Give a Sawyer an Umbrella...

He'll ask you for a chair.
Then he'll wonder if you have a spare table about, and he'll want that too.

Upon seeing the empty table, he'll ask you for a snack (cookies, if you please).

                  

This will of course make him thirsty, so he'll ask you for a drink.

Finally, once settled down to snack in the shade, he'll ask you to join him.

Naturally, you'll oblige.

(every little bit of this set up was 100% Sawyer led.  Well, I brought out the umbrella, and he took it from there.)

Lakeshore Live Steamers

For Father's day this year I made Jeff go to what I believed would be a mini train yard, with small trains that we could ride on and watch them roll around the tracks billowing steam.  What we actually found was a man, with a massive, hobbyish love for minute-scale trains, who had built an itsy bitsy track in his backyard.  His backyard people! I found it listed on the city's website for parks, and it was in his backyard! Are you getting a picture of awkwardness yes? Wait, please. Let me go on, there's more.

He was sitting in his backyard wearing a train engineer's hat, sipping cold ones with his buddies (all sitting behind their walkers) and told us to just walk around and have a good time while they sat and chatted and watched us.  Jeff tried to engage them in some conversation, hoping to make everything a little less strange, but it left me alone to chase Sawyer who was a post-church, napless madman.  In slow motion, I saw him run at the train, stop dead, stick his arm out, release his pointer finger and with a steady forward push, poke that miniature train right off the track. As it fell it wrenched out a dismal wail from the dying whistle, then all was unbearably quiet.

Thankfully, it could be mended, and as soon as everything was put right, we all but ran out of that backyard and, needless to say, never returned.

  

What I had hoped the dinky little train yard would be was something like the Lakeshore Live Steamers at Penitentiary Glen.  With two miles of tracks and small, but ride-worthy, trains driven by enthusiastic old men, these trains are not Hobby Lobby standard issue. They run on steam, or coal, engines on tracks with switches.  The wind blows your hair, you weave through trees, all the engineers toot their train whistles and literally everyone is smiling like happy fools.

It is perfect. Not at all awkward. Nothing to be broken. And we didn't have to scuttle out of someone's backyard to get home.

28 and Lookin' Great

All Jeff ever wants is a simple birthday celebration with steak, green beans, potatoes, and either chocolate chip cookies or yellow cake with chocolate frosting.  Presents are welcome, but he doesn't really ask for anything.  I'm always looking for ways to jazz it up, like give him a birthday week (that's a must for my birthday!), or make chocolate chip cookie cake three layers thick, and while every effort is appreciated, he remains happy Mr. Simple no matter what.

Despite simple wants, he proves to be anything but plain in nature.  He continually surprises me in the ways that grows and changes for the better,  I used to think I was better half - ha- but he is becoming a remarkable man and husband and I have to work hard so I don't get left behind as the dead-weight in this relationship.

Jeff is astonishingly intelligent. Not in a useless facts, full of blah-blah-blah, you all listen while I talk kind of way, but the more enduring and rare kind of intelligence that not only thinks for itself, but processes quickly and can generate original ideas. He'll be so embarrassed (but secretly pleased) that I'm putting this in writing!

Jeffrey's the best kind of man, we all adore him and were more than happy to simply celebrate his special day.