ROCKED!

If you don't want to read this super long post with every little detail, here's the short of it:

My husby pulled off a perfect, wonderful, incredible surprise party and one of my favorite people in the world - my little sister, Adrianne - flew in from Vegas with her husband and three kids to surprise me. I have an incredible husband, sister, brother-in-law, and friends!

My world was ROCKED, my birthday ROCKED, my husby ROCKS...and so do my sister, brother-in-law, and friends!

Let me take you with me as I try to make sense of, and document, the intricacies of the deception that lead to the biggest surprise of my life from my end of things. Everything in { } is what I found out after the fact...

Tyler told me a month or two ago that he was going on a rafting trip with the YM on Saturday the 22nd, my actual birthday, so we would need to celebrate on Friday night instead. I gave him a bit of a hard time about this. After all, last year on my birthday he climbed a mountain and so we celebrated early then too. Is it too much to ask to celebrate your birthday ON your birthday?! Actually, I didn't care much, I just wanted to hassle him a bit. He's really good at planning things and I told him I wanted to be surprised by whatever it was we did on Friday night. Little did I know.

So last Sunday at Church he asked one of our favorite babysitters, Jessica, to babysit on Friday night. She said yes. {He also told her she was going to call on Thursday night and tell a lie to cancel; she was pretty nervous about it} We talked about the night and he said there were two parts and that he hoped Everett could last about 4 hours without having to be fed. I am never totally sure, but thought he could. He said that we MIGHT have time to go feed him in between dinner and the next part of the night. I found out that week that the rafting trip was cancelled and the YM were going to do a campout on Friday, but he wasn't going to have to go to any part of it. We talked about changing our date to Saturday but he said that he didn't think it would work to change it because of the second thing he had planned for Friday night. He wasn't SO opposed to the idea (since that might have tipped me off) he just said that he'd rather keep it on Friday and then we could hang out as a family on Saturday. I thought that sounded really nice.

On Thursday at about noon, Ty walks in the door. He never walks in the door at noon. I had talked to him about an hour before and he was encouraging me to get showered for the speech I'd have to record for my online Public Speaking class that afternoon. I thought, "I'll get to it when I get to it. Why are you trying to tell me what to do? Sheesh." He never dictates my life like that and later said that should have tipped me off. It probably should have. Well, he walks in and I still haven't showered because I did not pick up on the hint, so he tells me that I'd better get upstairs and shower FAST. So I run upstairs, trying to get him to tell me what's going on. I start to get in the shower and he comes in and says, "You're not washing your hair, are you?" Ummm, I was planning on it. "You don't have time. Hurry!" The doorbell rings and I realize he's serious. So I get showered and ready super fast and come downstairs to find my dear friend, Tristalene, on the couch. Ty is home to watch the kids while she whisks me away to lunch. So nice! We head to RoundTable Pizza where a group of friends have gathered for a surprise lunch. It was so, so fun. We chatted and ate and my friend Jennifer made a Krispy Kreme "cake" that I loved. While I was there my friend Rebecca asked what I was doing for my actual birthday. I told her that Tyler had something fun planned for Friday night. She said, "I have a rare Friday night with nothing to do, so if you need someone to babysit I would be willing." I told her thanks, but we already had Jessica coming to babysit. I go home happy and grateful for such good people in my life. {This was a great decoy surprise...who in their right mind would expect ANOTHER surprise party the next day?!}

Thursday afternoon I talked to my sister, Adrianne, who was leaving that afternoon for California. She and her family were going to the beach on Friday and then Disneyland on Saturday. {Really Ty called them at the beginning of the year to share his idea for this weekend and they bought tickets clear back in February and they're leaving that afternoon for Seattle where they'll stay the night and spend Friday until it's time to drive to our side of the water for the surprise party} I had a secret hope in my heart that she might come and surprise me for my birthday, but realize there's no way she can talk about going to Disneyland in front of her little kids and then not really go. I tell her to have fun and I'll most likely talk to her on Sunday when they get home.

Thursday night about 9:00 I get a phone call from Jessica, our babysitter for Friday. She has a family emergency in Idaho and won't be able to babysit after all. Man! Ty says that he'll call Chari, another young woman in our ward. Chari is Rebecca's daughter and the kids love Chari too. Rebecca, if you'll remember, offered her babysitting services just that afternoon. I forgot about that, though, until a few minutes into the phone call when Chari "isn't there" to talk to. I whisper that information to Ty who says, "Oh! Dana just told me that you'd be willing to babysit." {Rebecca is giggling on the other end while they are all waiting for me to say, "Oh! Rebecca offered to babysit"} It's arranged, we'll take the kids to Rebecca's house the following night.

Friday we went and did our big grocery shopping trips. After those we took the kids to Toys R Us to spend the gift certificates they got from Tutu and Papa Ted. After Toys R Us I realize that I don't have my wallet which I had set in the seat of the shopping cart at WalMart. Ty didn't know it was there and he was the one who unloaded the cart. That caused a frenzy because we had dinner reservations at 5:30. {And over 40 people showing up for a surprise party who will be waiting for us} Ugh. We head back to Poulsbo, a 15 minute drive, to look for said wallet. To no avail. Who comes across a wallet and decides to take it? Punk. That put a major damper on things and I asked Ty if we should just cancel and go out on Saturday night instead. He's not soemphatic, but says that he thinks we should still go that night. So we hurry home, unload our groceries, try to nurse the babe who won't eat which causes more stress because now he's supposed to go another 4 hours as far as I know {this really works into the plan quite nicely}, and head out the door. Ty runs the kids into Rebecca's and tells me I have to wait in the car because I'll talk too much and cause us to be even later {Rebecca gave him that idea (because she knows me well :) ) and it wasn't out of the ordinary; we usually have Ty be the one to drop off the kids because we're usually running late and I DO talk too much} I know that's absolutely right so I stay put and call Adri to tell her about my wallet and see how the beach was. {She thought it was Ty and was surprised to hear my voice. They're driving to Rebecca's house and she's hoping that I don't hear the rain on the car windshield because she just told me how nice the beach was.}

Finally we're headed to the restaurant and I start to chill out and enjoy the time with my man. On the way there he hits the steering wheel and says, "Oh no! I forgot something." I ask what and he says that we need to stop by home after dinner to pick up swimsuits and towels but won't tell me where we are going with them. {Very good decoy...put my mind so far from a party at Rebecca's} I realized I'd forgotten the diaper bag anyway so we are going to have to stop by and pick it up and then we'll have to make time to nurse Everett since he hadn't eaten before we left. We went to a Japanese Hibachi restaurant and loved it. I was trying to figure out where we could be going with swimsuits, hoping that it's not a very public place since I just had a baby three and a half months ago. :) I make all sorts of guesses and try really hard to figure out what it could be{much to Tyler's delight}.

We leave the restaurant and the lost wallet is all but forgotten. I was having a great time and felt so in love with this handsome man of mine. We were driving home to get the diaper bag and swimsuits and Ty tells me to call Rebecca and tell her we're on our way. "Why?" I ask. "So that she knows we're coming and can be ready. Maybe we should just check to see if Everett is even hungry." So I call and she tells me that he just started getting fussy. Perfect timing. We'll be there in a bit. We stop and pick up our stuff and then head to Rebecca's. All I'm thinking about is the next phase of the date and where we could possibly be going. We walk up to Rebecca's and she answers the door with my sleeping babe in her arms. "Sorry, he fell asleep." She turns and walks into the house while we follow her. "That's okay, I'll just wake him up and feed him real quick." As we're following her I see some Hawaiian decorations hanging up...BUT I was so thrown off course that it didn't even cross my mind they could be for me. I thought, "I wonder if they're having a party for Matt (her son who's graduating) tomorrow." I walk down the hall and follow Rebecca to the kitchen. I come around the corner and...HOLY COW! There is a huge sea of faces and camera flashes. I backed up, totally shocked and laughing, and hit Ty a few times while they all sang Happy Birthday. I was so blown away. I just kept trying to wrap my mind around it. Wasn't it just by chance that the kids were there that night? Was this really the plan all along? I kept saying, "I don't understand!"

A fuzzy 'initial shock' picture by Ty

Another fuzzy 'initial shock' picture

Can you believe this guy?! I love him so.

I felt so loved and loved looking at each person who came! Next they had me sit on the couch to watch a video Ty put together. First was my in-laws wishing me a Happy Birthday, next was my sister-in-law Megan, then I broke down in tears when I saw my friends Kelly and Janet. (You guys totally made me cry; I have a video to prove it) Then all of my siblings and my parents were on there. It was so thoughtful and I loved every second. At first I didn't see Adri's family on the list of names for the video and I thought, 'Maybe they ARE coming!' But then I saw their names last and my heart accepted once again that they were, indeed, in California. However, their video popped up and all that was on it was their empty couch with my sister's voice saying, "You've reached the Tippetts. We're not home right now. If you want to reach us, Danalin, you'll have to turn around" (or something close to that). I said, "No way!" and turned around to see my sister and her family behind me. **Cue immediate 'ugly cry'** Oh. My. Goodness. Just because I had a hope doesn't mean I EVER thought they would actually come! I was beyond shocked. We hugged and cried for a bit. The talk of the night was that I slapped her...but it was a soft, I-can't-believe-you're-here! kind of slap. It really took me a few hours to absorb everything. My mind was reeling.

Enjoying the birthday messages from family and friends

Watching the Tippetts family's video; realizing that Adri and her family are in the same house

The hug before the "slap"..sorry, Adri!

The party was SO fun! There was delicious Hawaiian food, compliments of Ilona, which I enjoyed the next day as leftovers since I was so stuffed from dinner. I loved chatting with everyone. Oh and the cake! Ty had them blow up a picture of me and put it on edible paper...the girl at the store talked him in to a magazine cover. :) Kind of creepy to eat your own face. Ty got my lips. The details of this whole thing amazed me. What a man, what a mighty good man I married! I even received some really nice gifts. SO much kindness.

Fosters and Tippetts

The ladies who made it all possible! Jennifer Kelly (L) and Rebecca Dean (R). Love them!

Then Adri and her family got to come home with us for the weekend! Despite the weather, we had a perfect weekend with them. We got to kayak, go shopping, the guys went to the driving range, we went on a double date while Jessica finally got to babysit :), and just had a wonderful visit.

Oh, so fun to have cousins at our house!

Kayaking at Island Lake

I LOVE this woman! THANK YOU FOR COMING, Adri!

Finding crabs at Waterfront Park

I still can't believe how well it was all pulled off. THANK YOU to everyone who did SO much! I feel like there is no way for me to really thank you and tell you how much it meant. So much work, so much time...so thoughtful. Amazing. I will never forget turning 30! It's going to be a great decade.