The Birthday, and Such

So....We've had a bit of a whirlwind, the last few days...it's called Rory's seventh birthday!  He was our Valentine seven years ago, showing up just the day before Valentine's day!  So, I asked Rory what he wanted to do for his birthday.  First of all, he wanted to have a party, a sleepover, and a playdate at Chuck E. Cheese.  Well.  I am very far from being a Supermom, so I said he could do ONE of those things.  He chose Chuck E. Cheese.  That was probably a good thing, as I didn't have to clean the house!  The bad thing is, I didn't clean the house.  Oh, well.  So, Saturday, we started out the morning by getting his picture taken at the studio.  This is our first full year of homeschooling, and I realized that because he was not in school, he was not getting a school picture.  This was more fun, anyway, and we got to choose from a bunch of poses!  The funny thing was, that he chose to wear a black dress shirt and tie, untucked, blue jeans, and penny loafers (actually, Mom and Dad chose the penny loafers.  Rory wanted to wear brown tie-up dress shoes, but we didn't think they'd go as well).  Now, I think it had to do with the "GQ" look, but the photographer posed him in all these model poses, hands on hips, etc.  He looked like such a little man!  His favorite pose was the one where he was throwing a baseball, though.

After the pictures, we went to Rory's favorite restaurant, Bugaboo Creek, and then on to Chuck E. Cheese, for a fun afternoon with some friends.  After this, we had to go to Barnes and Noble, and Toys R Us, so he could spend his birthday money!  By the time we got home, EVERYONE was tired.  But, hey, you're only seven once!

The other thing that happened Saturday was that Lily got scouted by a talent scout. Mike had taken Rory to the restroom so that he could change into his Spiderman sweatsuit while we waited for his pictures to be printed, and Lily and I were walking around the mall, waiting to meet them back at the picture studio.  All of a sudden, this guy came over from a booth and said that Lily was very cute, and had we ever thought of having her model?  Well,  NO!  But I filled out the card with our names and phone number, anyway.  The agency called us Sunday, and set up an appointment to bring both kids to be seen by a director next week.  I don't really know where this is going to go, but if they can make a little money for college, I guess that's a good thing.  I pray that we will be wise, and understand what we're getting into here.  I beg all of you who are reading this to please pray with us!  Thanks!

Okay, back to The Birthday.  You thought it was over, right?  Not Quite!  Because some of the friends Rory invited to Chuck E. Cheese are unable to eat foods with gluten, we decided to have his cake when we got home.  Rory also decided to bring cupcakes to the pot-luck at our church the next day.  We had one cupcake with three candles on it.  Why three candles?  You would have to ask Rory.  Rory sometimes talks to God, and hears back.  I think this was one of those times.  As we finished the church service, we found out that there was another little boy there with a birthday actually ON Valentine's Day.  Then, we find out that his little brother's birthday is next week.  Go figure - three boys with birthdays, three candles.  So we distributed two of the candles to two other cupcakes, and they all blew them out at once.  God is good!

So now, I think that the birthday is finally over.  I'm trying to catch up on the laundry and the housecleaning and the homeschool and the organizing and the cooking and the grocery shopping and the...and the...and the...

Oh - one more "God is good!"  Money is a bit tight right now, partly because of the frequent oil deliveries we have to have to keep our house warm in the winter, so we were a little concerned about how we were going to pay for all of the birthday fun.  (Oil was delivered after we made plans).  Meanwhile, we have had a car sitting here for months that we have been trying to sell.  Believe it or not, our neighbors expressed interest in the car, and actually came and bought it with cash on Friday night!  We were not expecting them to come at that time, but it was perfect timing, because we had plenty of money to pay for everything we had planned for Rory's birthday, with some left over!  Thank You, God!