We had a rough time planning Gabriel's birthday party. We figured he's still young enough that we could get away with only having family to make the planning easier, but Jeff's work schedule has him gone on Saturdays and Sundays.
We were thinking we would have just a short dinner time family get together during the week, but that would have been hard on family in Visalia. We finally realized today was a day off for most people so we just had to figure out a time early enough for Visalia people to get home, but late enough so the people who didn't have the day off could come.
We finally figured it out. It was perfect. Then Jeff got called to a fire. He told us to go on without him, but we were both really sad about it.
When I broke the news to Gabriel, he said, "Well, maybe he'll be here when it's not my birthday." There were times when it clearly bothered him, like when he had to silence everyone at the party to tell them his daddy couldn't be there, but he had a really fun time.
He loved playing with cousins, was completely spoiled with presents, and even got to video chat with Daddy before bed. He is such a sweet boy and it was a lot of fun getting to celebrate him.
