A Munchkin after my own heart

Last week Mr. Hot Pilot, Munchkin and I spent our spring break down in sunny Florida visiting Mr. HP's family and torturing ourselves with the blinding sunshine, happy times of Disney World and the God-awful white sandy beaches of Tampa Florida. While down there with my two favorite guys I got to know my little Munchkin on a whole new level : I realized that at least three-quarters of his brain is filled with jokes about butts, poop and farts. If it weren't for the fact that I have neither the stretch marks nor the petrified fear of enduring childbirth, I would most certainly be convinced that this is my biological child. (Doesn't really matter if he is or isn't, he is still my Munchkin)

He is never shy about releasing his piquant bodily odors and our being in Disney World made this fact no different. It didn't matter that we were crowded shoulder to shoulder with about 10,000 other Disney freaks to watch the evening parade. While sitting on the shoulders of the man I love, he let loose his deadly gases. I didn't know quite what was going on behind me when I heard Mr. HP begin yelling "Dude, what the heck?" until the warm fragrance of doom overtook me and the man next to me gave me an evil glare and shuffled away from me. After a moment of appropriate shaming, I noticed something new about my little Munchkin - embarrassment. It used to be that we could joke around with Munchkin about things but this time was different. Instead we heard the exasperated sigh of a 7 year old who couldn't take the chiding of his super immature parents. "Dad-day! Car-ray!" was all he said in a rather valley girl-esque manner and sulked back to the car with us. Coming from the boy who is proud of his accomplishments and adores the smell of skunk (I swear) we were a bit taken aback by this new emotional development.

The next day he was back to his normal gross little boy ways of attempting to rub dead bugs and nose goblins on us. Instead of scolding him, I knelt down and kindly reminded him that due to his shorter stature, he is at perfect butt level of all of the other adults in queue and that he would be the first to suffer the effects if a butt-splosion were to occur.

Munchkins face contorted into a half grin/half look of fear.

This parenting thing? Totally rocks.

Lowery Park Zoo - Tampa

Pics from our family's spring break holiday. Lucky for us Mr. Hot Pilot hails from sunny Tampa Florida so visiting family is always a beach vacation.

One way to instill humility

Growing up, my parents instilled rather strict christian moral values in my brothers and I. I would like to think that I still hold most of these morals near and dear my heart, but look folks I am nearly 28. I have been married before. (Gasp! I know! Worse than my decision to buy a second blue Dodge Neon!) I had put a couple of not so great relationships under my belt before I met the more-awesome-than-he-lets-on Mr. Hot Pilot and my world was once again turned upright.

Now Mr. Hot Pilot and I share the same christian values and enjoy doing things the right way in order to ensure that we don't fall into the same craptacular rat hole that we both ended up in with our first marriages - i.e - he with the world's craziest blonde chick and I with the world's least self motivated guy. Let me tell you, he and I would forgo a rockin' honeymoon if it meant eternal peace, sunshine and not the slightest chance of a mental breakdown.

So I didn't think much of it the other day while I was at my annual chick appointment and my doc asked if it was ok for her to leave a message on my machine regarding my results. Of course I didn't care, and I went on my merry way.

Imagine my shock and surprise when I was sitting at the computer the other night and my mother went to play the messages in the voicemail, and I heard the cheery voice of my doc. "Hi there, just wanted to let you know everything is negative, and your pregnancy test was negative. Hope you have a great day!".

I began yelling "Oh my God! I know I'm not pregnant for crying out loud! It was just routine! Oh God! I already know I'm not because I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING!!!".

Funny how even at 27 one phone call from the doc can entice such a feeling of utter humiliation.

Censorship for kids!

When we were kids growing up, there were many things our parents put the kibosh on and kept us sheltered from : rap music, rock music, any music found on mainstream radio, The Simpsons, horror movies, crack smoking, swearing, vodka shooters and any movie with a rating higher than PG. Looking back I can certainly understand the extreme measures they went to to ensure that my brothers never saw a set of boobies before the age of 21 and I never saw a mans 'danger zone' until at least 3 years after I married.

I still remember going through the annual 5lb JC Penney catalog as a teen trying to find my style, and realizing that my mother had ripped out the 'lingerie' section in order to keep my brothers from fulfilling their curiosity by viewing middle aged women modeling granny panties or maternity bras. Very enticing.

When it came to movies and television, my parents were very guarded about what we were and were not allowed to watch. These rules lightened up quite a bit by the time my youngest brother was a teenager, but I had to live my younger years without the likes of "Roseanne" or "The Simpsons". Not good for a kid trying to be cool in the 5th grade.

Any time we watched a movie, my mother would sit in her chair, poised with the remote control to scan forward in case a woman were to dance bare chested across the screen. There had been more than one occasion where we would be watching a movie as a family when a love scene would suddenly appear and out of the corner of our eyes a small figure clad in flannel kitten pajamas would move in slow motion from the side shouting "No-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o!!!!" and block everyones view with her nightshirt. It was quite a picture.

Now-a-days we are used to seeing every movie imaginable with my parents. And I believe that they have become used to having grown children whom they don't have to censor movies for. It is because of this new and more grown-up life that we got caught in a sticky situation on Thanksgiving day.

As usual we were looking for a movie to go and see after Thanksgiving dinner. My dad suggested "The Four Christmases" with Reece Witherspoon and that guy that Jennifer Aniston once shouldn't have dated. I thought it looked funny and we decided to all go, Mr. Hot Pilot and Munchkin included.

We should have known something was amiss when we didn't see any other elementary aged children in the audience. Then Mr. Hot Pilot whispered "are you sure this is rated only PG?" to me as the rather grown-up previews flashed across the screen.

I hadn't even thought about what rating this movie was. I'm not accustomed to even thinking about it.

Then the first scene of the movie flashes up and after the two characters begin ripping each others clothes off in a bathroom, I realize we have trouble.

Without a second thought, Mr. Hot Pilot had Munchkin in a football hold and was racing down the steps and out of the theater. Looking back it was rather funny, although I was quite embarassed that we even went to see the movie with Munchkin.

Luckily we got our money back and all was right with the world again.

Maybe, just maybe, I will become the mom who will wear flannel kitten pajamas and ensure Munchkin never sees any womans bits and pieces until he is at least 35.

It all started with a little cat puke

Ok. I'm 11 minutes late with my post for Tuesday. I figure I can have some leeway however seeing as how I did in fact post twice on one day. I promise. Just look through my blog list. Also I was very busy today. Busier than my normal Tuesday which consists of sleeping until I can not sleep anymore, then waking up in order to loll through my normal routine, decide against wearing make-up because it would take too much effort, not even make any sort of attempt with my impossibly straight hair and then throw on clothes that make me feel least fat. Sigh.

Today was different. Today, my boys were in town and we had things to do! Things to see! Chick-fil-a to be eaten! Here is a play by play of my very awesome Tuesday :

1 - Wake up and suddenly realize I forgot to make the return home flight reservations for Mr. Hot Pilot and Munchkin.

2 - Decide to wake up Mr. Hot Pilot and inform him of this fact.

3 - Hide my face as Mr. Hot Pilot freaks out.

4 - Finally wake up and get myself ready in order to be met with a pile of cat puke outside of my door.

5 - Clean aforementioned cat puke.

6 - Cuddle with cat who puked because the puke cat is actually really awesome. P.S - don't let anyone know I actually said I like a cat. I will deny it to my grave.

7 - Get on the road Jack!

8 - Ate at Chick-fil-a. Had their peppermint chocolate chip milkshake. Am lactose intolerant. WAS TOTALLY WORTH IT.

9 - Head to Baltimore to show off the Maryland Science Center to my boys.

10 - Listened as Munchkin complained that his legs hurt/were tired. Told him I had no idea he was such an old fogie and mentioned an early bedtime perhaps? Strangely Munchkin agreed.

11 - Headed to work to pick up stickers I left behind. Munchkin was offered candy. Munchkin refused. Again, very strange.

12 - Arrived home with a suddenly lethargic and hot Munchkin. Munchkin wanted nothing to do with Ms. Terry's meatballs or the loving licks of our puppy Pepper.

13 - Munchkin had a fever of 101.4.

14 - Gave Munchkin Tylenol, Munchkin fell asleep in bed and Mr. Hot Pilot and I went out in search of Motrin.

15 - Bought aforementioned Motrin, then headed to Old Navy where I tried on a weird hat. Then headed over to Kohls where Mr. Hot Pilot took more pictures of me in weird hats and we bought Mr. Hot Pilot some snazzy jeans. The junk in his trunk looks good.

16 - Came home and suddenly Munchkin was better! And saying "Hi Mr. George! I'm playing and drinking apple juice now!"

17 - Munchkin was right as rain. Fever gone. Miraculous little Munchkin.

18 - Munchkin goes to bed for real this time.

19 - Mr. Hot Pilot and I watch this really stupid movie about a bunch of teens who stumble upon ancient ruins in Mexico - that contain people eating plants. Both wonder why they didn't just torch the place and head back to the beach.

20 - Bedtime. Gotta get up in the a.m to head to Staten Island to visit relatives of Mr. Hot Pilot.

G'night!

Heating things up

So tomorrow is the day that my boys will be flying up to the cold, arctic heart of Maryland. I must say that I feel badly, yanking them out of their 70 degree bliss down in the decrepit desert that is Del Rio, Texas to bring them up to a place where just standing outside for a few minutes will freeze your noobies off.

I reminded and reminded Mr. Hot Pilot to pack their heavy jackets, but for some reason I get the feeling that we will be making an emergency pit stop at the local Old Navy to outfit Munchkin in something heavier than "spring weight" cotton.

Oh and did I mention that Mr. Hot Pilot (and Munchkin too) is Puerto Rican (and a super hot one at that!) and hails from Tampa? And that he will turn the heat on IN THE SUMMERTIME if he deems it necessary? Yeah, he is going to die at my house.

I currently live with my parents (because I am a) too cheap too lonely to live alone; b) cheap loving my address; c) a raging freeloader not down with the economy and d) waiting patiently for a ring on my left hand not moving out until I marry Mr. Hot Pilot) who like to keep the temperature at a chilly 68 degrees.

Mr. Hot Pilot will attempt to physically harm me (and by harm I mean TURN THE HEAT ON IN THE SUMMER) if I dare accidentally, possibly, maybe fall into the thermostat on his wall and potentially hit a button that might or might not have lowered the temperature to 74 degrees. Yeah, its kind of like that. So needless to say, I had better drag up some blankets, quilts and an extra space heater for my boys, lest I find icicles hanging from their nose hairs in the morning.

I am, afterall, a fabulous hostess!

That Pun Was TOTALLY Intended

The war is back on between Mr. Hot Pilot and I. We are constantly going back and forth about who's town/state is crazier and I believe I have totally found a story that will pickle your beets when you read it.

Now Mr. Hot Pilot does not actually hail from Nebraska, however he spent his not so good years in Omaha while stationed there and I believe we should count all of the places we have lived in our war of weirdness. (I have lived in Maryland and Pensacola, Florida. He has lived in Florida and every other backwards city that side of the Mississippi.) I should also note that Mr. Hot Pilot still owns a house in Omaha, which has now been on the market for about 18 months. Why? Because who in their right mind would want to live in Omaha? (Commence the not-so-happy Pro-Omaha comments....now.)

Today's bit of weirdness includes butt humor. So if you can't handle a good butt humor story or were brought up to respect the finer things in life, then you are boring and might want to direct your attention here. Otherwise, the story goes a bit like this:

So there is some 35 year old guy in Nebraska who has found that normal, everyday, run-of-the-mill graffiti is just not his thing. He wants to express himself in a more elaborate way, experiment with a different medium. That medium is his booty and some lotion/vaseline. He then skips around town to local churches, stores and the occasional school to press his bunky cheeks up on the window for some poor sap to come across the next day and clean up.

(Read the rest of the story here.)

CharmCityChica = 2; Mr. Hot Pilot = 3 The war continues...

The Skies Are Alive With Rainbows and Fairies

Could it be? Is it really true? Have The Airlines heard my plea over ridiculous airfare? Have they read my rant and lowered their prices to accomodate the butts of not only Munchkin but Mr. Hot Pilot on their flight?

Highly doubtful. Ok, entirely ridiculously doubtful.

But for some reason, the clouds opened up, the birds flew back up from the south and started singing show tunes, a rainbow landing at The Hippo's doorstep swept across the sky, the fat man across the street put on a damn shirt and the diamonds encrusted on 50 Cent's chompers aligned. Air Tran dropped their crazy prices by about $180 bucks and my boys will now be joining my family and I for thanksgiving dinner.

Thank goodness for automatic emails sent directly to my inbox from every airline in the Eastern United States. One small victory for this girl.

Oh, and by the way?



Eat this, and You. Will. Die.

The Airline of Impending Doom

When one is in a long distance relationship, there are often times that really make you want to stand out on your back deck and scream to the high heavens about just how much the suckage is getting to you. If I knew I wouldn't be dragged away in a dingy straight jacket, that is just what I would be doing right now.

Mr. Hot Pilot and I have been working at this long distance thing for over a year and a half now. To be perfectly honest I have to admit that I am the luckiest girl on the planet to be with such a kind, sweet, intelligent, oh-so patient wonderful man who will occasionally let me vomit my emotional blatherings all over him. And then tell me how much he loves me.

My latest emotional upheaval was due to this little group called The Airlines. And they took a big massive poop on my day yesterday. You see, I often will travel every other week down to that dust bowl called Del Rio, Texas to visit my boys. My workweek begins on a Friday and ends on a Sunday (and yes I actually work 40 hours in those 3 days) so my only days to travel to and fro are on Monday and Thursday.

Thanksgiving week should have been one of those weeks when I would be packing my bags to be with my boys for some much needed bonding time. Unfortunately since I would be flying back home to Maryland on Thanksgiving day and since neither of my brothers would be able to make it to Thanksgiving at my parents house, I figured that I would just stay put in Maryland to kill two birds with one stone. So Mr. Hot Pilot began looking to see if it were possible to fly up with Munchkin to spend the holiday with my family and I and made the mistake of mentioning it to me.

I got overly excited.

I found what seemed to be the deal of a lifetime on Air Tran.com, where they were advertising $89 one way travel from San Antonio to Baltimore. I about wet my pants with glee. The site seemed to be giving me some troubles and I was unable to buy two tickets at once (I would pay their way up here and they would pay their way back) so when I went back to buy the second ticket at that shining $89 price, the monkey poop hit the fan. I was only able to find a ticket for $388. "This can't be right, there has to be some sort of mistake".

No mistake. After calling Air Tran TWICE about this I learned that I had not only bought the last ticket at that price (even though they were STILL advertising it!) but now I would not be able to return my ticket or change it unless I wanted to pony up a $75 fee. On an $89 ticket.

I was screwed.

By the time Mr. Hot Pilot and I did the math and tried to find a better plan, we decided in the end that it all was just way too much money, mostly due to that $388 blinger. We were able to find $89 one way travel back from Baltimore to San Antonio for $89 (bless you Delta Airlines) but that $388 just really dinged the whole deal. So now not only will I be spending Thanksgiving week in a nearly empty house (save for Thanksgiving day of course) but my boys will be left without any apple pie or snuggle time.

Oh yeah, and now I get to cat sit. Sweet.

No Promises, I'm Feeling Lazy

Saturday is not a day off for me. My entire work week consists of hovering over trauma patients on Friday, Saturday and Sunday with Monday - Thursday either being travel days or days I park my ever expanding booty in front of a computer and work from home for an ungrateful little pharmacy that really should have been punished more as a child and sent to bed early with no dinner instead of only receiving the requisite time out.



In honor of my brain feeling like mush from the rather hectic day (you mean just because someone smashed up their car on the road due to their drinking too many Vodka tonics I ACTUALLY HAVE TO WORK??) I have decided to post a couple of pictures from my latest trip to the wasteland that is Del Rio, Texas. If it weren't for the fact that the hottest Puerto Rican man on the face of the planet lived there along with his cute little sidekick, Munchkin, I would never venture that far south. Ever.




Hope your weekend is fantabulous!

The forerunner of yellow light history

Remember back a bit when I mentioned the story of little Ana Christina who decided it would be lots of fun to draw my Munchkin peeing on the ground? Well, little miss psycho pants has struck again.

My days are never at a loss for hilarious awesomeness whenever I am down here with my Munchkin and Mr. Hot Pilot. Fart jokes, skunk smell, and other sorts of bathroom humor abound. Monday when Mr. Hot Pilot and I went to get our Munchkin from school, he produced yet another stapled together book with hand-drawn pictures done by all of his classmates. This time instead of a picture of Munckin peeing on the ground, there was a picture of Munchkin looking rather cheerful holding the leash to our cat Twinkle, standing right near the house. But this was no ordinary house you see. Miss Psycho Pants decided to draw a bomb on the house.

Believe me when I say that I laughed, but it was a nervous "holy crap, this kid is nuts!" laugh. Apparently neither Munchkin nor the teacher caught this little terrorist gesture or I believe this girl would be headed down red light lane with no hope of another green light for years to come.

The only piece of advice I could offer my dear, sweet, skunk smell loving Munchkin is this. (You see his daddy, my Hot Pilot was married to Munchkin's mother for some time - Munchkins not-exactly-sane, often delusional, verbally abusive, needs to be locked in a mental institution for a very long time very mentally unstable mother.)

"If you ever find yourself attracted to this girl down the line and want to marry her? Don't."

Touch my Subway, you die

Yesterday I flew back down to Texas to visit with my Munchkin and Hot Pilot. It is always an interesting adventure seeing who will be travelling with you, and watching all of the other travellers who are in the same painful predicament that you are. I only say that travel is painful since usually I have to wake up about 3 hours BEFORE the crack of dawn. On this trip I did the same thing only to find that when I got to the airport they hadn't posted what gate I needed to go to, nor did any of the Air Tran gates have any information other than "Stand By" written on them. Sweet.

I finally sat down and turned to my blackberry for assistance. I found that my gate was D3 and proceeded to a gate that looked like a war torn country complete with wires sticking out of walls haphazardly and a few baby-faced military men. Indeed this was my gate. I then finally boarded the plane only to find that my window seat just so happened to be the only seat on the entire plane WITHOUT A WINDOW.

I had to change planes in Hotlanta where at my gate I was accosted by two toddlers while their mother (who by the way was wearing diaper-butted black capris with palm trees on the thighs and then completed this sexy ensemble with thick chenille socks scrunched down on her cankles and beat up black clogs. Classy.) gave me a smile like "aren't my children just DARLING?". Not so much. When the daughter tried to paw through my purse is when things got ugly. I bum rushed blondie, tackled her to the ground and shoved a copy of the latest Glamour magazine" in her face gave the woman the look of death (you know the one where you cut your eyes and slowly turn away in disgust - learned it from my mom) and she finally got the hint and proceeded to steal another un-suspecting woman's seat.

I finally then boarded the plane heading to San Antonio and was seated next to a rather chatty red-headed woman. About 30 minutes into the flight however while holding her cup of tomato juice (barf) she had a sudden attack of what can only be called narcolepsy and fell asleep, spilling the contents of aforementioned barf smelling tomato juice all over me. We both exited the plane looking like someone had hurled their lunch all over both of us. My boyfriend thought it was just super hot.

Hi honey, I'm home!

Birthday probe

Nearly one month ago was my mom's 2nd 26th birthday. As usual there was dining out, gifts and cards to be enjoyed by her. When you have had to raise three awesome and crazy kids and one husband who needs to be raised right along with them, you pretty much deserve an awesome birthday each year.

My mom's health insurance company thought so too.

I came downstairs this morning to find a "happy birthday" of sorts sitting on the kitchen counter from Kaiser Permanente. I saw the words "Happy birthday" and "birthday month" which of course made me think "wow, what a cool insurance company". Then I saw the true reason for the festive correspondence.

TIME TO SCHEDULE YOUR COLONOSCOPY.

Wow. What a way to poop on your birthday month. What a way to ruin all the joy and festivities you enjoyed.

I had toyed around with scanning the document in and posting it here since it really would have made your day, however there is this little federal law called HIPAA which tends to ruin fun things like leakage of personal protected health information. Whatever.

I then thought back to other fun things that have happened on peoples birthdays. Including my last birthday.

It was the first birthday I had spent with Mr. Hot Pilot and Munchkin. I was down in Texas enjoying what seemed to be a somewhat normal afternoon. Normal that is until Munchkin decided it was time for his daily constitutional, and by constitutional I mean losing half his body weight down a plumbing-challenged toilet. I heard the multiple flushes but didn't really think anything of it. It wasn't until I heard the little voice calling "Daddy? I need help..." that I thought maybe something might be up.

Then I heard Mr. Hot Pilot yell as though he saw a poop monster half eating our little Munchkin.

I stayed put. I'm no dummy.

Apparently my sitting perfectly still on the couch, not so much as BREATHING didn't do much for hiding myself. I should have jumped in the car and headed to Wal-Mart (no where else to run to really). Mr. Hot Pilot promptly sent Munchkin to his room and asked me if I might come and assist him in cleaning up a mess. A poop mess. (There seems to be a theme of poop going on here in my posts...I should look into that).

I walked into the main bathroom and there before me was a sea of toilet water flowing into the tub room, around the bend into the master bathroom and directly into the master bedroom. Sweet. Mr. Hot Pilot then proceeded to pull every towel, blanket and comforter out of rooms and closets to sop up the mess. I sort of stood there for a second and did the only thing I could possibly do.

I laughed my birthday booty off. Seriously, grow up in my family and anything having to do with a bodily function will elicit that exact reaction.

For the next hour or so we mopped and sopped while Munchkin was keeping watch of things from underneath his bedroom door. Every so often I'd see part of a Transformer or a little 6 year old finger poke out below as if to remind us he was still in captivity.

Finally we called maintenance to come in with an industrial poop sucker-upper (aka- a wet/dry vac) and pretty soon all was well. Munchkin was sprung from his prison and I was left with the question by Mr. Hot Pilot

"So what are you making us for dinner tonight?".

Happy birthday.

What all women desire during nights...

I was clearing out my spam box today when I came across an email with the subject "Update Request" and the line "What all women desire during nights". Instead of risking the healthy (re - actually functioning) future of my computer and clicking on the attached site, I decided to ponder just what it is that I request and desire during nights. (Right about now my mother and father who both frequent this blog are probably doing one of two things : 1) hitting the back button as quickly as they possibly can or 2) turning bright red, looking around and reading further out of morbid curiosity).

No worries though. I have a cleaner perspective on what I desire out of my night. And here they are :

1) My dog is weird. I think we have established that here and here. On occasion in the middle of the night, Lucy will wake me from a dead sleep with high pitched crying and kicking (yes, KICKING) of the wall for a drink of water. Recently however she has been wanting more and more water so that after I have gotten myself back to sleep, she wakes me up again with both the kicking, crying AND tossing of water dish into the wall. What a baby.

So what do I desire on these nights? An automatic water dish for my spoiled little dog.

2) I like my bedroom cold at night when I sleep. I love to snuggle under my squishy down comforter and find all of those super cold spots in the sheets. There is a problem with this however. My boyfriend is a supremely hot (temperature and otherwise) Puerto Rican who likes to keep the temperature in the house near 80 degrees. On the weeks that I am down in the third world country he calls home, we tend to have thermostat wars - and by wars I mean I sneak the temp down to 74 and then he catches me and cranks it back up to the point where it is so hot I can barely breathe. In other words, he always wins. ALWAYS.

What is it I desire on these nights? A cold bed and warm man.

3) I have gotten myself used to sleeping with the white noise of a fan for quite some time now. It all began back when I lived in a noisier part of town and was used to all of the traffic driving by my bedroom window at night. Strangely enough, when I moved back in with my parents I had trouble sleeping in their extremely silent house. I remedied this problem by running a fan at night - giving me both a colder room and the white noise I needed.

Back to my super-hot Mr. Hot Pilot.

Mr. Hot Pilot is a pilot (hence his name). His sleep is obviously quite precious to him, especially on the eve of a day of flying. Mr. Hot Pilot has gotten quite used to a supremely silent room at night. So while he has no problem falling asleep, I have a huge problem doing so. And so here is our solution (seriously, I kid you not...here goes...)

What do I desire during these silent nights? My hot pilot to snore.

I know. I can't believe it either, but sometimes in relationships you must compromise.

I'm fairly certain that had I opened that saucy message that not only would I have been taken to a world of clothing challenged folks who know "just what I want" but I would have also infected my computer in the way that a freshman girl looking to make lots of "friends" infects her latest victim.



So what do you desire "during the nights"?

My boys

So these are my boys. And this is the look they often get on their faces when engaged in a game of whatever (and I say that because they play anything and everything and its always the same look.)

 

Happy Birthday Mr. Hot Pilot!

 

Its birthday time!

"Awwww.... it was your birthday LAST year!!!" -Crow"

Tomorrow is Mr. Hot Pilot's 33rd birthday (yep, go ahead and do the math in your head...I'm 27...I'll wait) so of course I want to celebrate in the best way possible. Mr. Hot Pilot hasn't had the most celebratory birthdays in the past few years with the exception of last year, as that was our first year together. I want to do something that will make him feel super special and loved.

My mom has always made us kids a birthday cake on our birthday, and we all agree that her birthday cakes are by far better than any store bought cake. I want to start little traditions like this for Mr. Hot Pilot, Munchkin and I, but I really am not a baker. Even when I mentioned baking him a birthday cake, Mr. HP just said "why don't you just buy me an ice cream cake - it's easier".

Since I will be down in Del Rio where the major shopping center is WalMart, I am rather limited in my choices. I decided to look up some great cake designs, and found a few that might not be so appropriate now, but could fit the bill in another place and time:







I'm thinking however that he would be happier with one of these: