Last Saturday I turned 53! I can hardly believe it myself!
It was a busy day for me, in the morning we had a Parent Connection Group at one of my son’s school. I am the President of the Parent Association for this school, so I try to make as many of these things as possible. This time around was especially important as we stayed on to help with the holiday gifts for the staff which our group helped collect money for.
Some of the many wonderful people I’ve been lucky to work with in the Parents Association
Afterwards I met Adam and the boys at the gym. Adam and I played pickleball while the boys boxed. This Saturday was my last as a pickleball beginner. As of this week, I have moved up to intermediate. This was the best birthday present the instructors could have given me!
Afterwards I opened my gifts – was spoiled by many different gift cards and chocolates from my family.
Adam spoils me rotten, again!
We also celebrated at our go to spot – Shine Restaurant for dinner. We didn’t make as big of a dent as we did with Bubbie and Jack the week before, but we did pretty well!
Birthday Dinner
It was a really lovely day. I was so thankful that my family worked so hard to make it special for me. Despite the growing evidence of age, I’m very happy to have travelled another journey around the sun!
The kids had the entire week off for Thanksgiving so we were able to have a really nice holiday together.
After changing his ticket 2 times to accommodate the last minute cancelled classes, Jack arrived on Friday night. He looked pale, with dark circles under his eyes. At home later, we weighed him and he had lost 13 pounds in the two months he has been at college.
When Jack arrived, Bubbie was on the tail end of her visit to Chicago. We were lucky to have some overlap with all of us together.
Bubbie treated us to a dinner at Shine on Saturday night. When we were done ordering, the server said he couldn’t wait to see us eat it all. I don’t think he believed we could finish it all. Not only did we finish every single thing, but we ordered dessert as well!
Family Dinner at Shine
Sunday night Adam treated Bubbie and I to a night at the theater – we saw A Beautiful Noise, The Neil Diamond Musical. It was awesome. The lead singer, Nick Fradiani, won American Idol ninth season in 2014. His voice was like velvet and butter. Plus all the songs reminded me of growing up with my father, who played Neil Diamond for us many times.
As we had the whole week of Thanksgiving off, the boys decided they wanted to try boxing. We set them up 3 different times with lessons at the gym. Below is the video montage….
The instructor (a 2012 Chicago Golden Gloves boxing champion and a 2013 National USA silver medalist in Muay Thai) was impressed at how hard the boys worked and how strong they were.
Thursday morning we ran the Turkey Trot. The temperature with the wind chill was around 18 degrees. Still everyone decided to get up and go for it.
Calisoff’s run for the Metals!
Ben won for team Calisoff, finish in 23 minutes flat (it was a 5K) so that’s 7:24 pace. He finished in the top 5% of ALL runners (over 4000 runners). Jack was 24:17, Sam was 25:59, Aaron was 26:40, I finished with 31:20. Adam got a DNF, he pulled a calf muscle. Because Ben was so fast I missed him in the video below, but you can see the other boys pass me by at the turn around.
Afterwards we felt no guilt stuffing our faces with food….
Thanksgiving Dinner
The end of the weekend Mother Nature dumped lots of snow on us and the twins took the opportunity with a friend to go sledding.
Sledding
It was really nice to spend time to spend time together as a family. We spent a lot of time trying to fatten Jack up, going out to eat or just making his favorite dishes. The boys got to spend time together gaming, working out, or playing poker.
The best news is, in less than 3 weeks, we get Jack back again. This time for almost a month!
