Skip to main content

If Tomorrow is Your Birthday, Don't Read This Until After Opening Presents

Tomorrow is John's birthday.  I asked him what he wanted for his birthday, and the only idea he had was a new sun shade for the car windshield.  Bless his heart, but I wanted to do something a little more than that.  Something meaningful, yet frugal.  I've been thinking, googling, thinking some more, and finally came up with an idea!

Before I tell you what I did, let me tell you that for years, John has been talking about how great it would be to get a Big Boy statue and put it in our front yard and decorate it for each season/holiday.  (I'm pretty sure he isn't actually serious about this, but you never know . . . ) Anyway, earlier this year the antique store had the statue!  It was probably 7 feet tall, but the sticker price was too high.  Besides that, we would have had to rent a truck to even get it home.  However, I was able to find this little guy:


John was thrilled with his own Big Boy, but now he needs props to make it a seasonal item. I won't show you all of them, but here are a few I threw together:



I struggled a bit to figure out what to do for some of the months, until I discovered sports beads at the craft store.  Now Big Boy has leis for all of the seasons:  football, basketball, and baseball!  Here he is sporting his football lei:


I recognize this probably isn't one of those ideas that many other people will think, "Yes!  That is exactly what my husband will appreciate!", but I am excited, because I'm pretty sure John is going to be tickled pink. 

(In case you were wondering, yes, he will receive his wished-for sun shade, as well as a few other things.)

Thankful thought:  Thanks to John, my fun-loving husband.  Happy birthday!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Monday Mentions: Equate Crutches

Have you ever needed crutches? I hadn't, until a week ago.  I'm pretty sure I strained a muscle while running a half-marathon.  (That sounds kind of cool, doesn't it? I'm not actually that cool; the last time I strained a muscle it was from carrying too many shopping bags at once.) In any case, I found myself in need of some crutches. I sent my husband to the store to get some. Photo: A pair of crutches leans against a wall  Not that crutches are all that complex, but because I hadn't used any before, I wondered if I could figure out how to adjust them to fit me properly. I shouldn't have worried. John came home from Walmart with their generic store brand of crutches, complete with instructions. First, I needed to take out a long bolt that went through the hand grip. Then I needed to find my height range, push down two metal pieces, and slide the crutches until the little metal pieces came up in the hole near my height range. (Having two people for this...

Ten Things of Thankful: Live from Oregon, part 2

stock photo of old computer monitor When I was 10 or 11, I remember sitting next to my dad in our living room and reading computer code to him as he entered it into an Apple computer. We would finish the exercise and he would hit enter (or was it "run"?) and wait expectantly for the green type to appear on the screen. If we were lucky, the whole conversation would occur. Most often, there would be an error either in my dictation of the code, or in the typing of the code. We would then go painstakingly back through the lines, character by character, to find and correct the error. After what seemed like hours (and might have been), we would succeed and the computer would finally run the entire program. It was magical! My dad designed and built an earth-sheltered, passive solar home decades before solar panels were commonplace. He also was on a 9-month waiting list for a Prius, when hybrids were not seen on every street.  While my dad is definitely on the cutting edge of technol...

Ten Things of Thankful: Oregon Edition, Part 3

  A western bluebird, sitting at the base of a house window, looks inside Thanks (1) to those who have sent well-wishes for my mom's recovery. Her wrist is healing up nicely. I met a friend from high school for lunch this past week. It was so nice to have a chance to visit with her for a couple of hours. She is one of those friends who it doesn't matter how much time has passed, we can pick right back up into meaningful conversations. Lunch ended all too soon, but I'm so thankful (2) for her, and I'm thankful (3) that she reminded me of the importance of reaching out to others.  Being in my parents' home this week, visiting with a long-time (I'm not saying old!) friend, and with Mother's Day tomorrow, my mind naturally reflects upon the women in my life. I'm thankful (4) for an incredible mom--a gentle woman who taught and loved and guided us (and still does.) I'm thankful (5) for grandmas who were different in their personalities but united in their...