My Birthday Treat

Earlier this week I celebrated my 33rd birthday. Depending on where you are in life that may or may not sound old to you. When I was in college all those thirty-somethings with spouses and kids seemed so old but now that I'm here things look very different. It's not so old at all. Funny how things change.

I had a wonderful birthday. When David asked what I wanted for my birthday I told him I wanted to sleep in. So he took the day off and when the munchkins awoke at 6:30ish he got up and started their day with them. I woke up at 6:30 also as I am programmed to do now and though I didn't fall back asleep I did enjoy being lazy, reading and not actually getting out of bed until closer to 8.

I wanted to take the boys to the new kids area at the Grace Museum first thing in the morning but since that didn't open until 10 a.m. I snuck in a nap from 9 to 10 and then we made our journey to fabulous downtown Abilene. The Grace was a lot of fun even though most of the activities were a little too advanced for the boys right now. They had lots of fun playing anyway. Here are a few shots from our Grace Adventure.

This wall size work of art (located on the first floor) is very cool. When you touch each of the pieces it makes a different sound. Most of the sounds are musical in nature but there are train and car sounds as well. The boys (including the 32 year old one) enjoyed playing with all the neat sounds.

As you first walk toward the kids area of the museum there is this beach ball being suspended by air blowing from the tube. The boys enjoyed knocking it down, chasing it, and placing back on the stream of air.
Nathan played the pipe organ (sort of). It's really kind of hard to push the handle down hard enough to make a good sound but it does illustrate the basic idea of how a pipe organ works.
Benjamin liked to push the red button when the tornado machine stopped and make it start back up again.
This giant operation game was lots of fun for the whole family even though the boys were still too small to use the metal tongs to get the pieces out with. To them it was more like a giant puzzle. They liked taking the pieces out and putting them back where they belonged.
The boys also liked this giant sliding door exhibit of the different systems in the body.
I don't think it was actually designed for kids to walk between the doors but since the boys fit in there they thought it was pretty fun.
Here's Benjamin looking at the skeleton's hand.
This cab of a Volkswagen Beetle was lots of fun for the boys to 'test drive'. Behind the cab is the back of a interactive ambulance complete with CPR dummy for kids to play/learn with.
Peek-a-boo, I see Nathan inside that big ol' tree perfect for climbing around inside.
Peek-a-boo I see Benjamin too!
To end our tour of the Grace the boys rode off into the sunset sitting on these saddles (located on the third floor). Giddy-up!
After we finished playing at the Grace we went to my parents house for lunch. I opened my present from them and then left the boys with them while we came back over to Abilene. We went to a matinee showing of the movie Ratatouille at the cinema in the mall and then ate at Logan's Road House for dinner. They have my favorite steak there called the Teriyaki Club Sirloin and in my opinion it is the best steak in Abilene.

Once we finished dinner we went back to my parents and I bathed the boys in their guest bathroom tub. I prefer it to bathing them at home because the bathroom is arranged so that there is not a toilet right next to the tub like there is at our house. Then we put the boys in their pajamas, gave them their meds (I'm the only person in my house who doesn't take a daily allergy medication), loaded them in their car seats and headed for home.

It was a great day!

I learned last year that I have to celebrate my birthday on the actual day or I'm not a happy camper (and if Mama ain't happy...well, you know the rest). The two prior years on my birthdays I had been big and pregnant and therefore pampered and fed lots of chocolate. And I really enjoyed it being all about me (as it pretty much had been for all of my days prior to motherhood). But last year we celebrated early by going to a concert a few days before my birthday. Then on the actual day it was same old same old and I didn't like it one little bit. I remember eating a package of peanut butter crackers for dinner after putting the boys in bed and thinking 'this is not what I bargained for'. I should have just been grateful for my two beautiful boys sleeping peacefully in their beds and enjoyed my crackers but I was instead wallowing in self pity and experiencing a major paradigm shift - it wasn't really all about me. My cheese had been moved and in typical only child fashion I was not dealing well with change. God was faithful to me though (as He always is) and as I poured my heart out to Him He showed me that being Christ-like never involves being self-centered. He made me a mom so I would be forced to think of someone else first, so I would finally see past the end of my nose, and so I would draw closer to Him. How could I not want that sort of a bargain?

If anyone ever had the right to think it was all about Him, it would have been Jesus. I mean He was perfect, God's son, the long awaited Messiah, and He was...washing feet, what? It just doesn't seem to add up. We are told in Philippians 2 that "Christ Jesus who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant..." If Jesus' motto was "it's not all about me - my Father's will be done" then that certainly can be my motto as well. I do, however, require a little special treatment on my birthday.