Previously, I mentioned how before Patrick’s birthday I spent a lot of time worring about how much of a fuss to make over Patrick’s 2nd birthday. Then Bailey the Dog passed away last Tuesday, and I realized it was silly to worry about such things. In this post I will mention how his birthday weekend went down. Patrick’s birthday was on Sunday, the day that Daylight Savings Time ended for 2017. Patrick had a 25 hour birthday since Sunday was the day we turned our clocks back one hour. So hooray! Everyone slept in and who doesn’t want more birthday fun!
Friday: Also Known As Party Preparation Day
This year we decided to keep Patrick’s birthday party small because we wanted to host the party in our house (we live in a Cape Cod style house, and the first floor is on the small-ish side). We also wanted to keep this low stress for everyone so we invited only local family members.
This turned out to be for the best because I do not know if we would have had the energy to host a big party last week. I spent most of Friday morning cleaning up. 
During Patrick’s nap time in the afternoon, I baked his birthday cakes. I decided to make a Chocolate Texas Sheet Cake because it is delicious and is served from the pan and I am not that skilled at getting cakes out of pans. I got the recipe from The Joy of Cooking 75th Anniversary Edition. The icing was also chocolate and is one of my favorite icings from my childhood (thank you Mom for always making this icing for my birthday cakes 🙂 ). The recipe is from the Hershey’s Cocoa container from the 1980’s. Here is a link to the recipe.
I iced and decorated the cakes when I came home from working the evening shift at the library on Friday night. I have very little experience decorating cakes, so I purchased a pre-filled Pillsbury vanilla pastry bag to decorate the cakes. The icing came out a little thicker than I hoped it would.
Here are the final products:
Enjoy this close-up of the plastic Great Horned Owl that I put on the Happy Birthday Cake. Patrick and I picked it out at the Lehigh Valley Zoo. Owls are his favorite animal.
Saturday: Party Day
On Saturday, my husband and I decided to divide and conquer the tasks that still needed 
to be accomplished. My husband went shopping for the food items for the party that still needed to be purchased. I took Patrick to a playground wear him in order to wear him out so he would take a good nap before his party. We came home for lunch and by that time, Patrick was tired and he went down for a nap easily. Then my husband and I sprang into action. I finished some last-minute cleaning and set up the house for party time. My husband prepped the baked ziti we were serving as the main course. We made one pan of ziti with sausage and one with ground beef. He also prepared the salad and cut cheese for cheese and crackers. I put out bowls of veggie straws and chips. We also served fruit salad and home brewed beer and wine.
The party started at 3pm and luckily Patrick woke up just as the guest were arriving. He got right to work being an engaging host. He insisted on opening his presents as soon as everyone arrived, but he was so entertaining nobody wanted to stop him. He was delighted when we sang “Happy Birthday” and was excited to blow out his birthday candles. He was delighted by his guests and the attention! A great time was had by all!
Sunday: Patrick’s Actual Birthday
On Patrick’s actual birthday, we all slept a little later than normal because it was the end of daylight savings time. We purposely decided to keep our plans open for that day and to see where the day would take us. After a delicious birthday breakfast of eggy bread and grapes for Patrick and cheese omelets for mom and dad, Patrick played with some of his new toys until we all started to get a little restless. I decided that we should show my husband the park where Patrick had his nature class because it is very scenic and it has a “eco-playground”.
At the park, Patrick showed his father the zipline and they tried it out together:
Patrick loved the zipline and ended up going on it 5 times. My husband also tried it and with only a little hesitation, I decided to try it too! At 25 weeks pregnant, it left me a little winded. Luckily, we were able to coax Patrick into trying out some of the other elements at the playground because my husband and I both got a little winded!
Eventually though, we decided to take a walk around the park. This is when my husband said, “We have been here before, a long time ago with the dogs, before Patrick was born.” I didn’t remember at first, but then something clicked in my brain. We had been here before! It was when we first moved to the area more than four years ago. We had been looking for a different park that I had read about online. We didn’t have smart phones then and had been dependent on the GPS in our car, also I probably wrote down the wrong address and I am not really known for my ability to find things. We had gotten lost and ended up at this park and could not find any hiking trails so we were sort of frustrated and overwhelmed with learning a new area.
It was funny because I had come to that park for nine nature classes with Patrick during September and October and this revelation had never once occurred to me. But once he said it, I remembered that day perfectly. It was a little bit of a sad revelation though because it reminded me that our dog friends were no longer with us. The last time my husband and I were at that park together we did not have any children and the dogs were our constant companions. It reminded me that we were in a different place in our lives now. In some ways, we were very much the same but in some ways we were different from who we had been. It was a revelation that sometimes time passes quickly.
So we enjoyed our time with Patrick, the son who we had in the last four years during that passage of time, and we let him play until the sky started to look stormy and we were all starting to get hungry. It was a nice park visit and I am sure we will return again soon.
After a lunch of leftover baked ziti, bread, and fruit salad, Patrick took a nap. After the nap we spoke with some family on the phone who wanted to wish him a Happy Birthday, and went out for celebratory dinner at Red Robin.
It was a very nice weekend! Happy Birthday Patrick!
