So much for Cracker Barrel

Well, we pulled it off - barely and certainly not without incident. I had a surprise 40th birthday party for Don last night. His birthday is tomorrow, but his parents were driving down from West Virginia and his sister was flying over from Colorado, so it necessitated the party being on Saturday night.

Even though all the children knew about it (it was impossible to not have them in the loop - they were helping me with the shopping, overhearing phone calls, assisting with the guest list...), not a one of them slipped - or so I thought. Come to find out, after the fact, Daelyn has been secretly feeding Daddy information. Don has been eating Low-Carb for about a year and a half, so I made a special ice cream cake for him with sugar-free ice cream. I put some of his carb free bars in the food processor, crumbled them, and sprinkled the crumbs between the layers of ice cream. Then I softened cream cheese, added Splenda, lemon extract, and coloring, and used it to decorate the top of the cake. I was really excited and new Don would be pleased that I had gone to so much effort to make a cake he could eat. Last night he said, "You know, Daelyn told me about the cake. He said, 'Mommy put cookie crumbs on your ice cream cake.'"
He further told me that I had replaced the ice cream I used in his cake with the wrong stuff. Apparently, he had bought butter almond, which I had used in his cake. But I didn't pay close enough attention to the carton and replaced it with butter pecan. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out I had made him an ice cream cake.

There were lots of other slips, as well, and more lying than I care to admit to keep it a surprise and get Don out of the house so we could decorate. However, all-in-all, it was a fun party and everyone in attendance seemed to really enjoy themselves.

Don's sister hadn't seen Dane since he had just turned one, Deanna since she was three, and had never met Daelyn. She was only here for 2 1/2 hours, but she didn't have to leave for the airport until 10:00 this morning, so Don's parents decided to meet her for breakfast. We were trying to figure out the best place for them to meet and I suggested Cracker Barrel. Daelyn ran to me screaming and yelled, "Not Cracker Barrel - Waffle Barrel, that's where we need to go."

We decided to join them, as well, to give Don and the kids a little more time with their Auntie that they barely know. We arrived about 5 minutes late at Cracker Barrel. As we were trying to get settled, Daelyn ran to my elbow. "Mama, Mama," she yelled in my ear, then grabbed my chin and turned it towards his face. "This IS Waffle Barrel. Look! There's a reindeer over there."

I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. I thought, perhaps, he had seen some Santa item in the gift shop. But he kept pointing towards the fireplace. I looked long and hard and finally saw the deer head mounted above the fireplace. Ah! A reindeer head - must be Waffle Barrel, after all.