Audra Coldiron

Saturday was the day of Quinn's log awaited b-day party. He's literally been talking about his b-day party for, like, 10 months. He talked about it so much I decided I might as well plan for this one in advance. So, uncharacteristically I attempted to plan a party. Historically I've never been a successful party thrower. I don't know if it's me or just my weird luck but either no one comes or *everyone* comes and something goes horribly wrong. When I was a freshman in high school I had a b-day party in the haybarn. I told anyone who wanted to come to come. *Tons* of people showed up and my Dad was beside himself worrying (understandably so) that someone would smoke in the barn and set the whole place ablaze. He was also worried that underage kids would drink, drive, wreck, and he'd set sued. I couldn't understand it at the time but all his fears were justified. Anyway, his solution to all of this was to sit in his truck outside the haybarn with the headlights shining inside. Then, every once in a while he would walk around his truck carrying a baseball bat. I was just a little embarrassed, and by "at little" I mean "at lot". Henceforth through the rest of high school he was known as "Bat Man".

Another time while in high school I volunteered to hold a "young life" meeting at my house. All the rest were well attended (40+ people) but on my turn something else was going on and only a handful (6+) of people showed up. Those were just 2 examples from the early years. Through college and beyond it was exactly the same. Why should this party be any different, eh? I had high hopes.

To my complete surprise almost everyone I invited said they were attending. Had the curse been lifted? I schedule the party at Assateague Island with a guide and everything. They were going to have "critter talk" and a "scavenger hunt" and everything. Holly was going to bake the cupcakes and all I had to do was bring water, coordinate everyone, and of course pay for it. Quinn was really looking forward to it. Up until a few days beforehand the weather forecast only listed a 10% chance of rain. Well, the closer we go to Saturday the more the percentage went up until the night before I heard it was 60% chance of rain. Just great. I was so confident that it wasn't going to rain I didn't have a back-up plan.

My sister and her family came down Thursday night and my brother and their family came Friday night. They all planned to make a vacation out of it. Well... it started raining Thursday night and kept raining until Friday around noon when the sun came out. That night I attended Cinema Circle at the UU where we watched a documentary about the Dali Lama. Chrys and John were there and we talked about the party that was to be the next day. Chrys was pretty confident it wasn't going to rain citing the way they called for rain all that day and the sun came out half way through.

Afterward while at home I received an email from my Hip Klips contact who is in charge of getting the bags made. He had some bad news about the first factory who mistakenly made the bags before we gave the go-ahead. The prints were fine but the metal zippers on the black canvas and denim bags made those bags unusable. We offered to just buy the print bags and they refused. The second company doesn't have and commercial looking prints. My contact asked what we wanted to do. So with that news and the chance of rain on Quinn's big party got me really down. I talked to Holly that night and she suggested we have the party at her house in case of rain. I was relieved that she offered because really it was the only (though perfect) place to have it and host that many people. I sent an email out to everyone coming with the news that it might be at Holly's with directions.

The next day I awoke to a drizzle. I checked the weather forecast and it still called for rain but now the chance was higher. We put our house up for sale since the last blog post and that morning at 9:30 a showing was scheduled. We quickly got everything straightened up and road around Pittsville for a while talking about what to do about the party.
Mike asked when I was going to make the call to have it at Holly's. I said I would make the decision at 12:00 with the party being at 1:00 but really I ended up deciding much sooner and emailed everyone the news and called the people I knew didn't have access to email or were already on their way.

My dad and grandmother arrived at our house shortly after the showing was over. Mamaw brought flowers and dad planted them in the empty flower boxes on the back deck. Perfect since I was planning to buy some flowers to put there. Mamaw hadn't been to my house in years and hadn't even seen the staircase we had reversed to improve the functionality of the house nor the 1/2 bath we installed under it.

Dad was anxious to see the tree farm so we went over. Mamaw had also brought some big tomato plants for us to put into the ground. She used to run a greenhouse and sell early tomato plants professionally. She was go good at it that people would come from over 2 hours away just to buy her plants. We just barely looked at the place when Dad said he had just talked to my mom who was on her way to Holly's but didn't know how to get there. He suggested we head over to her house so we headed that direction.

We got there a little before 1:00 and Jen Harrison and her family were already there. They were going to camp out at Assateague the night before which was the inspiration for the party in the first place but when they got there not only was their plot underwater, it was so windy they couldn't even erect the tent they had planned on staying in. Luckily they have friends who live in Ocean Pines nearby so they spent the night with them.

Cars full of guests arrived. It was so good to see everyone! Once everyone saw Holly's farmette and all the animals such as kittens, Emus, baby goats, sheep, horses, chickens, etc, everyone forgot all about Assateague. Unlike Assateague the kids were actually able to *touch* the animals and run around without fear of stepping somewhere wrong. The men could play pool and there was plenty of places for women and their babies to sit and nurse. We had three infants there!!! Before we started the cake and presents we waited for the Egans who didn't get my email and who I neglected to call to tell the news that the party was at Holly's. They went all the way to Assateague then called when no one was there. Sorry guys!

Once they arrived all the kids sat around the table with their own cupcake and own candle, we lit them all, sang happy b-day then each kid blew out their own candle. After everyone ate we opened presents. I made sure my present was last because it was very special. People gave Quinn PJ's, science experiments, Pixar toys, gardening tools, and books. I gave him a joke book, a maze book, and the biggest surprise of all - the news that if all goes well he will have a brother or sister come December.

I'm pregnant!

I didn't want to tell anyone until we actually heard the heartbeat but this pregnancy unlike the two previous ones that ended in miscarriage is more like the first. I've been feeling quite sick though I haven't vomited yet. Since everyone was there who I would have told the news anyway, I thought it was the perfect time. If it doesn't work out then so be it but I have a good feeling about this one :-)

After that the kids played a bit more, the adults talked, and one by one people filtered out until we were the only ones left. Holly cooked us some burritos and taco and Mike and I took a nap. While we were sleeping Holly wisked Quinn away to Walmart to buy him stuff. She bought him quirt guns and some more cars. We finally left around 10:30.

Yesterday we showed Charlie around the tree farm and then went over to Holly's to help her with clipping the sheep's feet. I was again feeling pretty ill and she graciously cooked my an egg sandwich then I took an 1.5 hour nap. That night we took her out to Station 7 in celebration of Mother's Day.

Yesterday night and today so far have been *extremely* windy and rainy. Mike went over to the tree farm this morning to check on things and reported that one of our fruit trees blew completely out of the ground and a couple more were on 45 deg. angles. He's over there now staking them up. I hope they survive!

Mike and I had so much fun at the party and enjoyed everyone's company we think it would be nice to get together like that maybe 4 times a year instead of once. I think we'll try to arrange that with the next in August. Maybe we'll do a horseshoes-lemonade-cookout party! Then the next can be a bonfire roasting marshmallows and making s'mores! We'll see.

Happy b-day to Quinn. This is is actual b-day. I've uploaded some pics of the party and the tree farm.