Happy Birthday Kaiden Coby!

Seriously Can NOT Believe It's Been 4 Years!!

Like Mother Like Son, I guess - cause Lord knows how I love me some 'birthday festivities', and the way it worked out this year we are celebrating Kaiden's birthday over the course of 3 (yes count them three) weeks!  Haha, luckily I think he completely understands WHY it had to be spread out, so there is no pressure to 'top' this next year!

Goodbye Grampa Mark
Since our engagement, Dave and I have never like late night or early morning phone calls - cause they always turned out to be some horrible information like an accident or a loved one passing, and such was the case in the wee hours of Monday morning.  Mark had suffered a heart attack and did not survive it.  So after much deliberation we decided that Dave should fly out by himself to help Mary (his Mom) sort things out, pack up and get things under control about where her future would be taking place and of course to support her through the loss of her husband. So Saturday morning Dave headed towards the airport & was going to be in Arizona for the week and would be returning Friday, the day before Kaiden's birthday and our original plans were to spend his actual birthday at Stone Mountain Park enjoying an adventure pass & laser show ~ but we'll get to that in a minute ~  Well as Dave's time in AZ drew towards a close we were talking one night on the phone and he said to me "hey can you think of a reason why my Mom's calf and ankle would be swelling" ~ of course my first thought was just stress and being on her feet all day everday, but I went ahead and consulted my WebMD app, and the first 6 or 8 possible options was some sort of blood clot ~ not good!  I told Dave he needed to get her to a doctors ASAP, cause isolated swelling in a lower extremity like that is NOT normal and Dave suggested to Mary that they go to the ER that night, but Mary was exhausted and wanted to take a warm bath and she said she'd leave her swollen leg out of the hot water to prevent further swelling & if it was still swollen in the morning she would go see the doctor.  WELL, turns out Mary had DVT (Deep Vein Thrombosis) which IS a blood clot in the leg and they need immediate attention because these clots can break apart and travel to the lungs or heart, which after a few tests they determined that in fact two pieces of this clot had in fact broken off and traveled to each one of her lungs which is called pulmonary embolism ~ can you imagine how scary that stuff is!?  And compounded with the fact she had just buried her husband, poor Mary, so of course Dave had to cancel his return flight and leave it as an open ended ticket cause we had no idea how long Mary would be in the hospital with the treatment, and then we had no guess as to what would be her 'abilities' once released, so we prepared for Dave to spend at least another week in AZ.  Thankfully Mary is doing great!!  She was admitted to the hospital on Thursday and was released the following Tuesday, she is on drug therapy to keep her blood thin and has to have her levels checked weekly (I think) but she is home and recovering!

A Special Birthday Bonanza

Well as I mentioned earlier we were going to go to Stone Mountain on Saturday, which it turns out wouldn't have worked anyway cause of the change of plans, but it was also the Yellow Daisy Festival, which means HUGE crowds and I am NOT a fan of that and then of course SINCE Dave was going to be out of town we had to find something else to do, and luckily my Mom had taken the day off from her Chicco's job to be with us, so we sort of let the birthday boy decided what we did & where we went.  So first things first, he was upset that Dave was supposed to be home on Friday & then his birthday would be the next morning, he understood that Mary was sick, but I think he thought that because Dave wasn't home that it wouldn't be his birthday - ha, I assured him no matter what, when he woke up it WOULD be his birthday!!  Well bright and early Saturday morning, I had just looked at the clock and it was just before 7:00 and I couldn't believe that the boys were both still sleeping and just then I heard Kaiden's door open & he says "Mom, it's already MY Birthday today!" as he ran to my bed!  What a way to start the day!  So after getting to skype Dave & open a few birthday gifts 'together' (thank God for skype!) we packed our bags and headed the two miles over to Mom's house.  She fixed a special birthday breakfast for us and then we got our day started ~ we headed to Monkey Joe's of course!!  Where else would a 4 year old want to celebrate and as luck would have it there were two birthday parties going on while we were there so Kaiden kind of thought all the kids and balloons were there for him!  Score!!  Well after an hour or so of the chasing, squeals & screams from the kids ~ that place is EPIC on a weekend! ~ we decided it was time for lunch & then naps so we could get on with the afternoon/evening activities.  Since the Monkey Joe's we were at was in this cute family fun center, we decided to go just around the corner to Pepperoni's for Pizza, I was expecting Cici's and got DELICIOUS pizza!!  Seriously if you love a good (NOT fast food) pizza & you find yourself in Cumming, swing by & get theirs you will NOT be disappointed!

After eating our fill of super yummy Greek salad & pizza we headed back home to rest before heading back out again.  Kaiden wanted to pick out his birthday gift and of course Grammy was all for a little spoiling for a birthday boy whose Daddy was out of town, so once the boys were up we loaded back up and went to Target, which for a boy who ALWAYS knows exactly what he wants, he had a hard time deciding on his final present, after careful consideration and a few last minute doubts he left the proud owner of some Cars 2 character cars ~ it made him smile so that made us happy!  He also got to pick out his birthday cupcakes, you know I'm normally ALL about the cake, but with Dave out of town, no actual party planned & it just being me, Mom & the boys I did NOT see the point in going nuts & having a whole cake sitting around the house. . . SO he chose a variety pack of cupcakes that had HUGE dollops of chocolate icing & bright sprinkles, does anything say birthday better than sprinkles!?  So we gathered our bags & headed back to Mom's for dinner, we had planned a nice Salmon dinner for us & picked up Chik-fil-a for the boys en route.  It was a gorgeous evening & the boys enjoyed bringing their little table outside & playing & eating while Mom grilled up the salmon.  Once everyone had eaten it was time of course for cupcakes!

Happy Birthday To You!!