Surpise Party

My birthday this year fell on a Wednesday.  So the plan was to celebrate with the kids on my actual birthday and then Scott and I were going to go out Friday night to celebrate.  Like I mentioned earlier, I got sick on my birthday and spent Wednesday and Thursday in bed all day trying to get better.  I knew I had to get better because Saturday I would have a house full of company.  Scott's mom and my parents along with his Uncle David from Memphis were all coming for the weekend for Scott's first day as Bishop.  My thinking was if I stayed in bed for two days, hopefully I would feel good enough to do all the cleaning and shopping the day before they came to town. 

Well, Friday morning Will gave the secret away when he wanted to know where he was going to have his sleep-over that night.  At that comment I guessed Scott had planned a night away for us.  That didn't really surprise me.  I figured he would do something more than just take me out to dinner because #1 - I was turning 40, #2 - I did give him an amazing party for his 40th birthday, and #3 - because I am worth it!  But then my heart about stopped when Scott told me to pack a bag and that we were leaving in an hour!

An hour!!  What do you mean an hour?  Didn't he know that I had just layed in bed for two days, there was no food in the house, the house was a disaster and we had company coming in less than 30 hours?  I told him that I was trying really hard not to be mad at him because I didn't want to ruin his surprise.  But I just didn't understand why he couldn't had told me Wednesday that we would be going somewhere Friday morning and it was a surprise.  I guess I have a little too much of my mother in me when it comes to people coming to stay at my house - I need notice and time to prepare and stress!  Scott had robbed me of that time to prepare and doubled my stress!  But I could see how much thought he had put into this surprise - he had places for all the kids to stay and rides to all their activites so I tried to be a good sport. 

He told me put on a dress and pack a bag for overnight.  I guessed we would be going to the temple.  On the way there, Scott took a detour leading to the airport and then asked me, "Which Temple did you want to go to?".  Okay, now I was really surprised!  We were going somewhere on an airplane and knew we had to be back the next day.  So I guessed it was either Salt Lake City or San Francisco because it had to be close and I love both places.  Turns out we were headed to Salt Lake City.  Scott told me that we were going there to go to the temple, go shopping at my favorite store, NPS (a big warehouse full of junk!) and have dinner with my siblings.

When we showed up at my parent's house there was another surprise awaiting me!  Not only were my siblings there but a whole house full of family and friends! I couldn't believe he pulled off a surprise party from another State!  It was so fun because he had so many people there from all eras of my life and many that I hadn't seen in over 13 years.

The amazing spread of food

Brittnay, Heather and Heidi - the Stewart Sisters

Since I talked about my stress that weekend I guess it is only fair to mention all the stress my husband went through that week as well.  Just five days before our flight to Utah, Scott was called to be the Bishop of our congregation at church.  He had originally scheduled our flight to leave Friday and get home Sunday night.  But now, they would be setting him apart as the new Bishop at church here that Sunday.  He spent many frantic hours on the computer that day trying to get his mom and Uncle tickets to fly here while at the same time trying to change our flight plan without me knowing anything about it.  On top of all that, he wasn't supposed to tell anyone about this new calling until it became official on Sunday.  He said it was one of his hardest and most confusing weeks of his life.  He couldn't tell most people about being Bishop and how that had changed his plans for my birthday and he couldn't tell me anything about my trip to SLC and surprise party.  He couldn't remember who he could talk to about what by the end of the week!

Debbie Hannan Wunderli, Heidi, Jill Chytraus Tucker-Staska

Scott's assistant party planners:

My sister Heather...

Judy Jones, Clara Rushing and Sommer Rushing

Thanks so much to everyone that helped and came to the party.  I had so much fun seeing and visiting with everyone that I couldn't ever fall asleep that night (another trait passed on by my mother!)