You say it's your birthday...

Happy Birthday to Sam today! Linc started off the gift giving by actually sleeping through the night. Then, we woke Sam with a family pile-on in bed and lured him downstairs with the promise of fresh coffee and banana bread. Nico serenaded his father with the Happy Birthday song before giving him the present he had put together. Ok, so maybe it was just a couple of old toys wrapped in a spare box, but he was very excited for daddy to open that one first.

From there, we went to church, had lunch at Sam’s favorite Vietnamese restaurant, and then we stopped off at home to change for a Halloween carnival called Longhorn Halloween for the families of faculty and staff of UT. When we left the house again, it was with a jedi and a dinosaur in tow. The carnival was silly and driven by nothing but the kids’ sheer love of candy (that and a host of student volunteers in slightly too sexy costumes), but it is oddly enjoyable to watch your children have fun even in a mediocre, overcrowded, chaotic event. We learned that Nico is unbelievably good at the bean bag toss and that when you ask him to choose one piece of candy, it is like asking him to choose between his children. He just loves them all so much, it’s excruciating to choose his favorite. Linc was feeling a little grumpy, between the massive teeth he’s growing and the ear infection, but when we passed an area blasting music, he just had to get up and boogie. Nothing like a two foot tall dinosaur swinging his tail to the “Monster Mash.”

After a trip to the store for a gift exchange, a quick game of soccer in the back yard and some dinner, we rolled around the carpet for a while (sounds strange, but it’s so much fun to let the kids climb all over you, playfully wrestling and giggling and occasionally getting kicked in the face, on accident of course). We sat around and ate ice cream, the one real food we can all four eat together. Linc signed “more” frantically when he was ready for a bite, and when his father did not respond fast enough, tapped me on the leg and signed “more” and “eat” with a frustrated grunt. Now Linc is in bed, and Sam has taken Nico up for a bedtime story and song, leaving me alone down here thinking again what I said the other day. I wish we had more days together like this. I sure do like these people.