Birthdays

23 October - 27 October

I spent these days in Des Moines. My sister, Tom, and I had been planning something very special for a few months and we were in the final stages of planning. My mom, who was at a conference in San Diego this week, turned 50 years old! We were putting the final touches on her surprise birthday party for Saturday night. Sis had her childhood pictures scanned and I collected those in addition to some newer digital photos and made a slideshow of her life. After a few set backs with the scanning company, I finally got the photos at 14:00 on Friday and finished the slideshow at 02:00 Saturday morning! Phew!

I woke up Saturday at 07:00 to help distribute food for Angel Food Network Ministries http://www.angelfoodministries.com/. This usually involves picking up a rented moving truck and driving to the church where the semi brings the food. A semi brings food for five or six churches to the church with the largest order. Those churches with smaller orders (my church included) pick up their food and take it to their church to distribute to the people who ordered it.

I am generally on the truck helping to break down pallets of food and pass them off to the people on the ground - there's no fork lift or loading dock - just brute human (girl!) power. =) The people on the ground pass boxes one-by-one down the chain to trucks waiting to be loaded. We finished this by 10:30 then headed to our church to pass out food. This month, food was distributed from the firehouse in town. I finished up here at 14:00 went home and showered then went to meet Sis at 16:00 at the clubhouse to set up Mom's party.

Angel Food Network distribution at the firehouse in Runnels, IA

Friends and family arrived at 18:00 and Mom showed up as scheduled at 18:30. She thought she was going to a movie and then to the casino for the evening - dropping off my step-brothers at a friend's birthday party on the way. The boys went in to the party, wrapped gift and all, then ran back out to the car excited, begging Mom to come in to see the clown. The room was dark, slideshow rolling on the projector, and everyone was silent. She walked in, "SURPRISE!!" She was speechless for at least five minutes. If you know Mom, you know this is no small fete! haha!

Mom in a state of shock and/or embarassment

Backing up a moment, Mom had called me earlier in the day to see what I was up to. I told her I was helping the family with whom I live with Angel Food Distribution in Columbia, MO. She seemed a little down and I felt AWFUL for lying.

Now back to the party, I had been hiding in the back of the room and started moving to the front. The shock was wearing off and she began noticing individual people then she saw me. She screamed, "TIFFANIE!?!" This is what that moment looked like:

I love that I was able to capture this moment!

Everyone had a fantastic time and Mom was surely surprised. We all worried about this. If you know my Mom, you know why. She is so involved with everyone all the time, it's an absolute miracle that she had no idea.


We put 50 candles on her cake and lit every last one of them! Someone made mention of a blowtorch...

After the obligatory singing and toasting, Mom gave her best shot at extinguishing the fire before the alarms went off.

The family portrait, (from left) Jeff (bro-in-law), Lindsey (Sis), Grandpa, Grant (step-bro), Grandma, Mom, Tom (step-dad), Daniel (step-bro), Tiffanie, Autumn (niece), Jason (Bro), Jada (niece) sleeping in her stroller in front.

Then on Sunday, I met my family at Chuck E. Cheese's for Autumn's Birthday Party. She turned 8 years old on 30 October. It was a fantastic time - if you're into the simultaneous ear-gasm of screaming kids, the constant buzzing, ringing and dinging of video games and blaring televisions. Ok, seriously, it was fun! Autumn had fun and that's all that really matters here. I can't believe she's 8!

Autumn blowing out the candles on her delicious ice cream cake

What an awesome weekend!