Monday, November 10, 2014

Mema’s Surprise 70th

This past Saturday my mother-in-law turned 70. Since it is such a big birthday, I thought it would be fun to throw her a surprise party. About 3 weeks ago I sent out invitations to her family and friends and nearly all of them were able to come. Of course some couldn’t make it, but it was great that so many people were able to come and help us celebrate.

Tony and I tossed around the idea of having it catered, but in the end we decided to just make the food ourselves. Instead of doing dinner, we chose to have the party around lunch time, and we had a make your own sub station and vegetable soup. We had a few appetizers and sides to go with it and it worked out well. We made sure to pick up Mema’s favorite cake from Costco and served some ice cream with it. Nothing fancy, but it seemed to go over well with everyone.

Getting Umpa here for the party was the hard part, but once we had that figured out, everything went smoothly. Mema showed up just as we’d planned and when she walked through our front door, I can honestly say she was surprised! She didn’t have any idea what we were up to and it was great to see her so happy!

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Harper was so excited by all the people and commotion and he was the first to run to her and give her a big hug! Dakota was a little nervous about all the people and commotion so she hung out on my hip, but she did give Mema her hug once things settled down a bit.

This isn’t a very good picture, but with everyone taking pictures it was hard to get a good one. I just want to remember how excited Landon was about the whole surprise element to her birthday! He could NOT wait for her to walk through that door!

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Zoe, Mema and Brandon

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Diane (Mema’s friend), Chris and Mema

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Mema and Umpa

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Lauren and Lori

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Mema’s helper

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Lea

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Lauren

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Opening Gifts

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Zoe had to leave a little earlier than everyone else because she had to work, but it was awesome that she got to be there!

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As everyone left, I tried to get pictures of each of them with the birthday girl.

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This is Mema with her two siblings, Herman and Martha.

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Mema, her brother and his wife, Judy.

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Mema and her BFF Diane.

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Dakota and Lea

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Dakota, Lea and Harper

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We all had a great time at the party and I’m thrilled we were able to pull off the surprise! It was great getting to see so many people and we’re already thinking about having another get together in the not so distant future.

Happy Birthday, Mema! We sure love you!

1 comment:

Leslie said...

What a great surprise!!!! WTG putting it together and pulling it off. That cake looks amazing!! : )
Great photos.

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