My Daddy Came!

Sunday was Jacob's 2nd birthday. This event in an of itself deserves much comment (my baby is two!?!), but it was made even more special because of a visit from my dad.

My dad was here when Jacob was born. That meant more to me than I can adequately express here.

My dad surprised me last year by showing up at my door on Jacob's 1st birthday. Surprised is actually not the right word at all. I was SHOCKED to see him. I can't remember too many other times in life I felt truly speechless. That was a good one.

Saturday night, my dad showed up again for Jacob's birthday. Since last year's visit was such a hit, I admit I was half expecting him to show up again this year. But only half. We are all going on a cruise together next Saturday (Ben's parents, siblings, us, and MY parents)...I figured that there was no way he would really come all the way out here just a week before another planned trip.

I was working diligently on Jacob's birthday cake all afternoon on Saturday. Ben volunteered to take the "almost" two-year old out for a while so I could finish up. At some point I had checked my email and seen a message from my dad, sent at about 3:30 PST. I had the thought to write back and say something along the lines of, "Well, I guess since you're sitting there emailing me you're not going to surprise me this year, huh?" I figured I would reply once I finished the cake. Just a few more touches...all I needed was a paintbrush from the back room to finish Thomas' finer details.

The back bedroom was empty. Not empty, exactly, but not overflowing with Darren's things, as it had been earlier in the day. My apparently not-so-quick mind flashed back to earlier in the day when Darren had asked about washing the sheets on the bed. I had assumed he realized that they were disgusting after a month and a half of sleeping in them and wanted to not sleep in filth. And Ben was still gone with Jacob. In my intense cake decorating time warp, I had not really noticed the fact that my boys had been gone for much longer than it takes to go to the park and pick up some food for dinner. I became VERY suspicious at this point and called Ben, who was, innocently enough, at his parents' house. "On my way home!" he claimed.

And then my dad walked through the door.

While it wasn't the same speechless shock as last year, it was even more meaningful.

Maybe it's a function of getting older, maybe it's having a child yourself, maybe a combination of lots of things...but it sure is awesome when you get to the point that you can see your parents as the wonderful, special people that they are, as the people who still love you (and your children) more than anything else in the world.




Jakey and I are lucky ducks to have had Gumpa here for the party.