Quite Possibly the Best Birthday Present Ever

We were in North Dakota over the weekend.  It was a 50 hour trip.  I did not know why we were making this 50 hour trip to North Dakota in December, and quite frankly I was pretty skeptical about the idea.  In fact, I was pretty grouchy about the idea.  Dr. Peds kept telling me to trust him and that it had something to do with my birthday, but even then, there were some seriously grouchy moments, and really, I just didn’t want to go through all the chaos of packing everyone up and those painful long hours in the car with Squirmy screaming and the big kidlets squabbling.  To be sure, it was a painful car ride in both directions, although going was worse than coming back.

We arrived in Valley City late in the evening on Friday, and Saturday morning I spent playing with my nephew Baby Alex and visiting with family (more about that soon).  I was in the middle of playing a game of Uno with Dot and snuggling Squirmy, when Dr. Peds walked through the door with two of my best friends EVER, Siri and Rhonda.  I was so surprised!  In fact, I cried.  I hadn’t seen Rhonda for more than 5 years!  What a ridiculously long time!  I couldn’t believe that she was standing there in person.

In hindsight, my husband had given me all sorts of clues about this surprise that I had totally missed.  My friends snatched me off to Fargo for an overnight trip for just moms.  No kids!  It was a pretty amazing experience.   We ate ice cream, went out to eat supper, and went to the Concordia Christmas Concert.  Of course, we did plenty of visiting and catching up into the wee hours of the night as well.  It was so good to be with such great friends, friends who understand me in ways that possibly no other friends ever will.

I was extremely excited about getting to go to the Concordia Christmas Concert too.  I didn’t go to college at Concordia, but my husband and I started going to their concerts when we were dating, and we went every year when we were married until we had to move away from North Dakota.  The concerts are always so special for me, a masterpiece of amazing choral music performed so beautifully, arranged with the Christmas story in a way that always makes me think deeply and worship more  fully than I ever am able to on any given day even though I’m not in any of the choirs.  The experience has always been such a good way to begin the advent season, a way to set my mind where it needs to be.  In fact, when we moved from North Dakota to Wisconsin, I was so sad to know that I would probably not get to go to a Concordia Christmas concert for a long, long time.  I remember one afternoon the concert was being broadcast on Wisconsin Public radio.  I was snuggling newborn Mr. Sneaky Pants on the futon.  We were both wrapped up in a fuzzy blanket, and I was so devastated listening to the music and abbreviated narration.  I cried and cried, homesick and miserable.  The concert this year was as beautiful as ever.  I was so happy to be there.

How could there be a better birthday present?  Terrific friendship and a Christmas concert?  It was such a special time.  Thank you mastermind Siri.  Thank you oh-so-patient husband, who put up with a LOT to make this happen.

I took this picture of Siri’s super duper organized luggage.  (She actually folded her dirty clothes and put them back in her suitcase in order!  I just haphazardly crammed everything back into my overnight bag.) She thought I was ridiculous with my camera.  Rhonda predicted the picture would appear on the blog, and here it is!