Oh happy day...

Today is my birthday! Yea me! I got to spend part of the morning with some great people. My good friends Keao Sunaoka and Jenny took me to Boots and Kimo's for their famous pancakes. Actually I was going with or without them but it was much better with them along! Breakfast was great, thanks guys! I have been wanting to go there for about 2 years now a couldn't swing it until today.

When I got home the presents from my family came in the mail. Then right after I opened them my family called and sang me Happy Birthday. Tonight my uncle and auntie are coming over with my cousin and we are bbqing. This is the cousin that I share a birthday with. So it's for both of us.

Who knows what the rest of the day will bring but I'm very thankful for how it's been so far.

Keao Sunaoka and Jenny (notice the smothered pancakes in front of Jenny. I got one of those too. It was soooooo yummy!)

Celebrate good times, come on...

On Monday I was able to go out to dinner with my Birthday Dinner Club girls. It was so awesome. Especially considering that the last time I was out other then quick store runs was the Monday after grandpa went into the hospital, I really miss you guys!!!

Like I said I was able to escape...er, go out... to dinner. We went to Haleiwa Joe's here in Kaneohe. I had only been there once before and I always forget how much I like it. The atmosphere is amazing. And of course the food is great. I had the Teriyaki Sirloin with garlic mashed potatoes and green papaya salad. Yum! But the company was even better. I share this month with another friend, Auntie Judy (and of course millions of other people. I, in fact,
personally know 9 people born on my birthday) so the dinner the dinner was for both of us. Another friend, Auntie Sharen, got us tiaras to wear. It's become a tradition. It started 3 birthdays ago the first time they took me to dinner. I had told my mom that I was a little bummed because that was the first birthday that I wouldn't share with my family. As I mentioned in the past post, I love birthdays. But that year nothing would happen as my grandparents aren't ones to have celebrations or anything. I set up going out with friends to the Cheese Cake Factory but they didn't know it was because I wanted to do something for my birthday.

Well after I talked to my mom I get this call out of the blue from Auntie Judy, saying that she and a couple other friends wanted to take me to dinner. When I asked her if my mom talked to her all she said was "a little bird told me". I didn't know if I should be insulted or not. After all she just called my mom a bird! When I got to dinner my Auntie Sharen had a tiara for me to wear. I felt so special, though they made me wear it to the theaters when we went after dinner.
At the last dinner I got the tiaras for Auntie Sharen and Auntie Mary, starting it up again.

While we were waiting for dinner I looked up and noticed a cute little gecko hanging out by the light. I mentioned it when they asked what I was taking a picture of not knowing there was a geckophobe among us. And of course she was one of the ones sitting close to it. She was forced to change seats.

The next day I gave grandpa some of my leftovers. Now that he can eat that kinda of stuff I like to offer it when I can. So I chopped up some steak and heated some 'tators for him. He seemed to really enjoy it. Soon he was pau, or so I thought. Like 10 minutes later he told me that he hadn't had breakfast yet. I was surprised and asked if he was hungry. He told me he was. So I made him a scrambled egg and he ate about half. He told me he was full now. I wanted to ask him, are you sure, really sure???

Haleiwa Joe's

The view from our table, Haiku Gardens

Auntie Judy and me, the birthday girls

From left to right: Auntis Judy, Auntie Sharen, Angela, Auntie Mary

Make a wish!

Oops I did it again...

Yup once again I missed a birthday. This time it's my sister's Rena. So to you Rena I sing... happy birthday to youuuuu!


I have always loved birthdays. They were always so special. Maybe it's because that with such a large family like I have it's nice to have at least one day where you are the special one. You wake up and everyone wishes you "Happy Birthday". They are especially nice to you. We never had to do chores on our birthday. We got to have our favorite meals. Then there was always the presents from everyone. Cake and ice cream of our choice. And as we got older we always did the birthday sleepovers with all the girlfriends. Love birthdays! I will say though that I have had some that haven't been so fun.

I can remember one year my birthday fell in the same week as V.B.S. at our church. Though now that I think about most of my birthdays fell in the same week as V.B.S. But I digress. This particular year I, for some reason, didn't have a specific job. I was just a floating helper. That's unusual for me. Usually I'm in the thick of it. But not this year. Well on the day of my birth that year it rained... and rained... and rained. Now our house was built after WWII for a crippled war veteran and like most old houses it has it's quirks. One quirk is that the main sewer line that ties our house to the main city sewer line is made of terra cotta and is of course the same age of the house. Our neighborhood has a nice tree lawn. Which makes for a picturesque neighborhood but does horrible things to terra cotta sewer lines. You see the trees send out these hair-like roots in search of water. Over years these roots can find or make little holes in whatever they find that stands in the way of the water they want. It's quite amazing if you think about it... unless you think about what hair or hair-like roots do to drains. Yup you guessed it. Nasty!!! So lucky me, the only one who didn't have something that she absolutely do that night, got to stay home and clean up the basement. Which had about six inches in some areas nasty, disgusting, you-know-what-water. Luckily dad was able to snake it but I still had to mop up a bunch of bucketfuls. We had a carpet in one area that got wet so I had to drag that out to the trash by myself. Do you know how heavy wet carpet can be??? Then I had to disinfect everything. I had just finished when everybody came home, of course. I can't remember exactly how long I stayed in the shower, but it was a long time. I think I went through a bar of soap! Thankfully most birthdays aren't like that.