We had been planning on celebrating Baby's 5th birthday basically since she turned 4. It was another one of those moments where I looked around our 2-bedroom apartment and thought wistfully of a day in the future when life would return to normal. I think we were in our new house in Northville all of two days when I started to make plans ;-)
We titled the event "Baby's Birthday Bash" and called it BBB for short. Glo jumped right in, offering to make the invitations (both on the computer and by hand), and when she had those done by the beginning of September, she took on the planning and scheduling of it all as well. In fact, I contemplated ordering lanyards that could hold our daily schedules (I usually print up a schedule of events, but those aren't always carried around by the family which leads to the inevitable question "what are we doing next?"), and Glo printed up fun daily schedules along with chore assignments. The family kept thanking me for planning it all, but I gave full credit to Glo. She was amazing.
Sure enough, a month before, the invitations arrived in the mail. I don't know the specifics of everyone else's (Glo hand designed the envelopes), but mine was incredible!
I love buying clothes for people, and now that I have grandbabies, I don't hold back. I figured it would be a fun lead-up to BBB if Baby had some new outfits to choose from. She loves planning and looking ahead as well, so each morning she would sneak into my bedroom and ask me if she could pick a new gift bag with an outfit enclosed. It only took me a day or two of living with her again to realize the great incentives those bags were--it got to the point where she had to do her practicing, her exercising and her scripture reading before she could open one (and her mother occasionally threw in needing to take a bath). Ethan half-joked that all she needed to do was scoop the cat box or take out the trash and the circle of life would be complete ;-)
I loved seeing her excitement about pulling out something new to wear each day. And after six days, when she had run out of bags, we asked her what she was going to do the next day. She responded by replicating Chubby Checkers' "Twist" and said "Mix and match!" Sure enough, she came down with a different assortment of Halloween clothes. And while the shirts and leggings were switched around, she inevitably threw one of her tutus on top of it all. She also had spider and cat hair clips along with some bows. It was such a fun thing to do for our Halloween baby. And people loved it--when we would go out to run errands or out to eat, she got comments left and right.
Everybody arrived Wednesday night. We had to tell Baby they were coming in on Thursday, because it was just too much thinking that she would need to go to bed BEFORE they arrived. What a fun reunion it was Thursday morning! And speaking of reunions:
Hannah didn't even drop her backpack before she had Hootie in her arms. You can tell he was less than impressed...at least for the moment ;-)
Thursday, everyone still had classes and work, but I loved having everyone under the same roof. Yes, my grocery bill for the weekend was close to $400, and yes, we filled the dishwasher several times in a day, and yes, KitTen was nowhere to be found, but it was pure joy! That night, we drove the marathon route for the next day, and then everyone except Glo and me played a Halloween-themed Dungeons and Dragons with Mark as the Dungeon Master.
Glo and I curled up in my bed and watched "Rear Window" with Jimmy Stewart and the gorgeous Grace Kelly.
Friday morning. Seriously, who knew those two words could bring such terror into the hearts of the Kennedy men? All of the Kennedy men needed a marathon for the year, but with COVID and every in-person marathon being canceled, they decided to run a virtual marathon together. Mark and Ethan have highlighted their experiences in separate posts (THANK YOU!), but for Hannah, Rebecca and me, it was a completely different experience.
First though, props to Glo. She started running on her mission, and now, no matter the day or weather, she's out doing her three miles in the morning. In fact, on one of her Strava segments around Provo, she has been silently competing with a BYU All-American athlete. Before she left Provo, she ran the same segment five times in a row so that she could get a good lead on him over the weekend she would be gone. Anyway.... Ethan asked her if she'd like to run a half-marathon (her first), and in her casual, no-drama-llama way, she responded "Sure." Ethan sent her a training plan, and it wasn't even hard for her. I've always said she runs like a gazelle--it's not even difficult for her--and sure enough, running her first half marathon didn't even faze her. There's no complaining about being sore afterwards, no nap needed, no stress. She just woke up with the boys and got the job DONE!
But as anyone who has ever run a marathon knows, you need support in the form of water, snacks and encouragement. So, we drove part of the course the night before so we could scope out some places to stop for the runners (Ethan did an amazing job planning a route that started and ended at our home), and to make sure we were all sharing our location on our phones. I envisioned us bringing along a folding table and setting up stands along the way, but it was about five minutes into the marathon that I realized that wasn't going to happen at all.....
Ethan had planned out everything (seriously, my planner children bring little twinges of delight to my very left-brained mind), down to snacks. He had some with him, and we were bringing stashes to replenish his supply. Mark brought his Camel-Back for water. John brought nothing ;-). And since Glo is used to running in dry, high-altitude air, she knew that the moisture from the Michigan air alone would be enough for her to drink (LOL) ;-) So, Rebecca and I loaded up Coco with extra snacks, a gallon of water, Gatorades, and the babies and Hannah.
IT WAS FREAKING WINTER WHEN WE WOKE UP! There was actual snow falling from the sky. Glo had planned to run in her shorts, but after standing outside for a prayer, she ran back in and changed. As it turned out, Mark was the only one who was really dressed appropriately for the day (whether or not he planned that or it was just luck, we'll never know). We sang the national anthem to our virtual flag, and per the usual, I was moved to tears, although I'm not sure if it was because of the anthem itself or because it was my children singing the anthem with their amazing voices. And then, they headed out into the street in front of our house, Hannah counted them down, and they were off!
Remember those five minutes in and what I would quickly realize? Yeah, Ethan has been hard-core training for speed, and within five minutes, he was far ahead of the other three. It was then I realized that the next six hours were going to be a complex puzzle of figuring out how to get ahead of each runner to give them what they need...and then get to the next runner to do the same....and so on. You would think we could just stay in one place and wait for the next runner, but eventually the time difference was an hour, and we couldn't keep the runner in front (always Ethan) from getting support for over an hour especially at the speed he was running.
Oh man, please put me in a Ragnar race as a driver, because I seriously LOVED it! It was a joint effort with all of our phones to track who was where, and where we should drive to get ahead of them. And then figuring out what each would need, getting the music ready to play for them, and yelling our support. And as soon as we had done that with one runner, we'd find the next and do the same. We missed some key spots in the beginning because we thought we could just wait for one, but we learned that there could be no waiting. We just kept moving.
And it's a good thing that we kept track of everyone. At one point, Glo was supposed to split off from the pack to finish her half. We saw her doing that on the phone...and then we saw Mark and John following her. Yeah, I called John in a panic to tell him to turn around! Mark wasn't too happy about that little detour.
Baby had a violin lesson that morning, so about two hours in, I had to drive her and Rebecca back to the house. Hannah and I then flew back to downtown Northville so that we could create a finish line for Glo. Turns out, the route Ethan had planned was a bit short, so she just kept heading up and down the streets and finally ended her race on an uphill! But like Glo, she just hopped in the car, drank some water, curled up under our coats and logged into Zoom for her Spanish class. Yep, while we were continuing to find the men, we would hear her interjecting Spanish answers from the back seat ;-)
At this point, the runners were struggling, not because of lack of support or food, but because of the COLD. We ran to catch up with Ethan as he emerged from Maybury, and he was in a bad way. Honestly, he wasn't thinking super clearly. We got him into Coco, turned up the heat, gave him some food, and then I took off my t-shirt and hoodie and gave it to him to wear. It took him about five minutes to recover, but then he was off again. Same thing with John. At this point, I didn't have a shirt to give him, but I had what I thought was his coat that he had given us earlier because it was soaking wet and cold. It felt dry, so I tossed it out. It was as he was running away in it that I noticed its feminine cut, and realized that I had given him MY nice Eddie Bauer coat (which happens to be the same color and style of his) that was sitting in the back seat. I was still wearing my exercise EB coat, but with nothing underneath. When Mark came up and was also dealing with the cold, I told Hannah to take off her sweatshirt, but he refused it and said he was doing okay.
Everybody crossed the finish line that day. Rebecca ran the last mile with Ethan, and Hannie ran the last mile with John. John wasn't even supposed to be home, but when he found out he had the day off, he decided to run despite dealing with an injury for the past month. Glo finished her first half. Mark was a champ, almost vomiting at the finish line. Ethan, unbelievably, was emotional. Ethan and Mark had signed up for the Detroit Free Press marathon, a race that is usually held on Sunday, and John had signed up for the Air Force marathon. In true Air Force fashion, John received a notification that the AF had run out of money to send everyone their swag....
See John holding up his finger? All of them had the problem that the course wasn't exactly the length they needed, so they kept running back to add the needed mileage before crossing the finish line.
By the time John came in, Ethan and Glo had showered, but Mark hadn't. They were obviously chilled. And there's John in my cute EB jacket with the "Mom" pin <3 And Glo wearing my Birks and EB parka. And Mark wearing John's leather bomber jacket. And Ethan wearing John's thick sweatpants and clogs. Glo obviously needs to run a marathon because she looks like a million dollars!
Everybody had a chance to relax, warm up, eat and shower, and then we were off for family pictures! In fact, it was a race against the sun to get outside before it got too dark. We had tried in the summer to do family pictures, and no joke, we had arranged all of the colors and what people would wear....and then we had days of scheduling conflicts and RAIN. So I gave up and told everyone to just wear "fall" colors, and I'm sure it would turn out okay.
Holy smokes, what perfect timing. I thought that maybe we should postpone since everyone had just run, but I think it was both Rebecca and Hannah who reminded me how we've been thwarted before when we postpone pictures, so we headed out. I had bought clothes for Baby and Brother, and my goodness they looked cute. I guess that's what happens when Gap lets you down with basically no clothes in stock, and the only other store in the mall is a boutique ;-) And when Rebecca came down on Sunday in a pink jumper with a teal shirt, I convinced her to go shopping. She found THE most darling jumpsuit at Old Navy, and believe me, I was rather jealous of her petite figure. Everybody else just showed up including me, although there were a LOT of opinions about my original outfit (looking at you favorite orange Talbots sweater), so I went with the consensus of what looked best on me.
I won't lie. There were a lot of thoughts being thrown around about where we could go, but we have a wooded walking path in our neighborhood, so I put my foot down (again watching the clock) and said we would have a look there first. As I drove up, my jaw dropped. It couldn't have been more beautiful, and my family isn't too shabby looking either <3 Seriously, these will go on the wall.
Glo told me the next day, "My hair looked pretty good for being four days dirty, huh?" If only I had known! But yes, she can definitely rock post-marathon, four days dirty hair.
No rest for the weary. Next on the schedule was pumping carving, and earlier in the week I had been in PA at my favorite grocery store, Wegman's, and had loaded up the car with enough pumpkins for everyone. It sure is fun having children to came be so creative on their own!
Every night we read books, sing, say prayers and give kisses. I know it's SO EVIL of me, but I couldn't resist snapping a series of pictures of this nightly prayer:
We got up early and headed out to Dexter Cider Mill for cider and doughnuts, and then we went into Ann Arbor for a trip to Cherry Republic (and a tasty gift for Zach) and Vault of Midnight (for a collective drool from most of the Kennedys).
Hannah kept it simple (seriously, for her standards, this was Kindergarten level costuming), being the villain on the back of her shirt, Salem, as did Glo as Wednesday. I had found a wig for Glo a couple of days before, but for some crazy reason, Glo let Hannah do a number on the wig with scissors! I told Glo we would find another wig because I'm being honest, she rocked her dress. Really, I told her she could wear it around campus ;-) 
Then it was THE moment. Cake and presents! I mean really, we probably could've skipped everything else, and Baby would have been happy with just cake and presents. I had ordered a FABULOUS Baskin-Robbins ice cream cake for the occasion, complete with Baby's favorite strawberry ice cream. It didn't really match the cake or the occasion, but who am I to say "no"? Of course, Brother was all about blowing out the candles BEFORE Baby could, so we had to sing a couple of times to her, and then we did it again when he had his OWN piece and his OWN candles. And everyone was so generous. Toys, and art, and books, and just fun things all around! I seriously hope she will always know how much she is loved. (I had taken video on the first lighting, so I told her to look surprised for the actual photo. LOLOLOLOL!!!!!!! She's seriously the BEST!)
I think this weekend was probably one of the best moments of our recent family history. There was such a feeling of love and excitement. It makes me think that we might be able to keep this going as our family grows and ages. There's nothing better than my family. SEriously.
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