Jeremiah and the big 3-0

Jeremiah is officially 3 decades old!

If you need a reminder, Jeremiah’s birthday falls on September 11th. This year his 30th birthday was also the 10 year anniversary of the Twin Towers tragedy in New York City.
Since his b-day fell on a Sunday this year, we decided to celebrate the day before which happened to be 9-10-11.

This is what me and the boys gave to him for his birthday. We had these pictures framed for him. (I got to test out my new tripod!)

We really really REALLY love Jeremiah! He is the best dad and the best husband! He is a hard worker and after working his tail off at Farnsworth Wholesale Company, he comes home and tucks the boys in bed and always finds ways to make us all smile, even when I’m stressed out.


Isn't he handsome?

I had been anticipating the big 3-0 for some time now but I didn’t know what we would be able to do to celebrate. Since I am nursing Mason I usually don’t leave him with babysitters and when I do he has break-downs. So the closer Jeremiah’s birthday got the more I worried about not being able to do anything fun.  Jeremiah earned some extra $ at Farnsworth and was able to buy his ultimate birthday gift: a new AR-15! He wanted to take it out shooting for his birthday, and I wanted to go too, but we decided that since Jeremiah needed more bullets, and we didn't want to leave Mason for that long that we would postpone our plinking outing until another day.

What did we do instead?


I took him to the most manly place: As You Wish. We painted pottery. haha.
Jeremiah painted a “Plinking Pennies” jar, so he can get donations for bullets for his new gun. He painted it to look like a grenade! It’s so clever, and manly.
And I made a yellow plate with black swirls that says “The Halls”. My last platter shows the family in stick figures and Mason isn’t included so it was time for a new one. I’ll have to take some pictures of our projects.

Ok, it’s not shooting up loaded soda cans but we had a lot of fun. The best part is that we get to sit and talk. That doesn’t happened very often when there are 3 kids around.
Later that night we had a bunch of Jeremiah’s family over for dinner and a big ol’ chocolate Costco cake with 30 candles.




On Sunday, the actual day of his B-day, we headed to Thatcher for Ellery’s baby blessing. I was so grateful that Jeremiah was willing to spend his day on the road so we could make it to the special occasion.

I had forgotten that it was Sept. 11th until we got to Globe.



As we drove through downtown Globe we saw this. We pulled over to take a picture because it was stunning! The flag was huge! It was a beautiful, patriotic sight to see!


I had planned a nostalgic picnic at the “duck ponds” in Safford. A place where we used to go when we were dating in college.

I packed our picnic lunch but rushed out the door without snacks for the trip to Safford and the kids were starving. We had to stop halfway there so I could feed Mason and we ate our sandwich rolls and grapes. Then when we got to Safford we hit the Burger King drive through and got burgers and 2 large drinks, one drink for the grown ups and one for the kids.

When we arrived at the fair grounds we grabbed all our stuff and Jeremiah asked Simon to hold the boy’s lemonade. As he was walking down the stairs he tripped and fell down, twisting his ankle and spilling the entire large cup of lemonade. (Did I mention that Ryan LOVES lemonade and he had been waiting so patiently so he could drink it?)

Simon was crying, I had my hands full with a stroller, picnic bag, the other drink, and baby. As the lemonade splashed onto the sidewalk and dripped into the grass I almost joined Simon in a good cry.

The boys didn’t enjoy the rest of our picnic. Their little hearts were broken at the loss of their precious lemonade.





Then there was the ants. Giant ants EVERYWHERE. Simon was scared of them because someone had told him that they are like fire ants and their bites hurt so bad they make you cry. I’m pretty sure these ants don’t bite but we didn’t give them a chance to try. We did have a nice walk around the park, watching for ants and blowing in the wind. Yes, there was wind too.


At least Mason had a pretty good time.




Things got better when the boys got to cross a bridge and play around in the gazebo. They made friends with another little boy playing there and they finally all had smiles on their faces.

Then Mason started to get cranky because of the wind and it was time to get dressed and go find Heidi and Austin’s church.



The baby blessing was beautiful. And Ellery was absolutely adorable in a crocheted dress that Heidi wore when she was blessed as a baby, and a hair bow that Heidi made for her sweet little girl. I wish I had pictures. Ellery is such a doll! I wish Heidi lived close by so I could see her and and Ellery all the time.  I just can't get enough of that baby!

On the way home from Thatcher we stopped about 5 times for nursing, potty breaks, and dinner. Once again our “quick trip” home ended up taking almost twice as long as normal.

I think Jeremiah had a birthday to remember.

Happy Birthday to the best husband and daddy to our sweet kids! We love you so much!