Grant's Birthday

Well, Grant gave a preview of his birthday. A new (old) car, saying goodbye to his beloved Mercury Cougar (which is still in front of our house, by the way!), and hanging out with his family.

Grant and I both have birthdays in August. His is first, then three weeks later (to the day!) is mine. So then I have to sort of set a standard for gifts, etc. Or fail at that. In the past I've said "ooo, let's not do gifts", not given him anything, and then three weeks later he gets me a gift! Ahh! Then I look like the cheap-skate that doesn't care about my husband/boyfriend! A couple of years ago I hit it good when I gave him some Keen sandals that I went specifically to Cabela*s for. Unfortunately on that birthday, Cer*ner ruined it for him by not letting him leave and making him work for almost 24 hours straight.

So this year, I decided to get him a cake. I thought about making it but realized that my pregnant-self is too stressed to handle that and preparing a meal for 8 people. So, I asked my friend at work, Nohemi, for her cake lady's name. She goes to a place called Elvira's Cakes... it is a hispanic place and is located of Indep Avenue in KC. Luckily, I'm familiar with the area as I have friends that live in the Northeast. I confirmed with Nohemi that Ms. Elvira speaks English and off I went. I ordered a chocolate cake, as Grant requested, and decided on white frosting with royal blue accents. Ms. Elvira (or whoever helped me) did speak some English. I felt that I basically got what I requested. I also ordered a balloon bouquet and bought steaks for dinner, something I'm not very proficient at. I told Grant I bought him a KC Strip and then couldn't afford that for the whole party. By deduction, I went with the 2nd most expensive steak, assuming that meant it was good, for everyone else.

So on Friday, I picked up some great looking balloons in blues and greens, and went to get the cake. I had Nohemi look at the receipt for me before I went to pick it up and she said hmmm, it says "fruitas" on here. I wonder if you accidently ordered fruit on the cake. HMMM... she said sometimes Ms. Elvira does that. I said, well, we'll see! I get to the place and pick up a beautiful cake, complete with a fruit border - cherries, strawberries, and peaches (canned fruit, I might add). Grant's name was spelled right and Happy Birthday was in english! His name was in quotes, though, so my sis wants to know what other names he goes by. It was a yummy cake and quite the fun "lost in translation" moment.

We ate yummy dinner and cake with Grant's parents, sister and husband, and my parents. We also got to tell them the gender of the baby, which I'll post on here after we tell our Monday Night Dinner friends tonight, and give Grant some gifts. His parents stayed for the weekend so we had some fun shopping and seeing Bob Dylan. I'll probably have to put that in a separate post though, as I better get off to work!

Overall, I think it was a successful birthday!

The cake.


Holly and Bryan



A book that Grant's mom gave him from childhood. Apparently she would cry every time she read it.



A running/work-out shirt I gave Grant.