pulling the trigger on birthday fun

it's been several days of non-stop celebration for team kollar. our tradition for bill's birthday is dinner at red robin...

because it's fun to have strangers sing happy birthday to you. and because my man loves his cheeseburger and fries with a "big cup of mayo" for dipping the fries. just like the french. and people with high cholesterol.

we are still getting used to tate's birthday without his birthday buddy, my mom known as gunga. before last year, it was like this...

tate never decided how he would spend his birthday. he just cherished that he shared that special day with her. and got to hear her say yet again, "tatie, you were my best birthday present ever." not only do we feel her absence in our celebration, but it means that tate now decides what the day will be like. last year family came to town to be with him, so there was no deciding. this year, i gave him a list of 6 things that i thought were suitable for a golden birthday celebration. he chose laser tag with his cousins and french silk pie...

we went to a three level laser tag course. i thought it was sweet how excited emmie was that i was playing until i heard her say, "now i won't get the low score." my kids have such little faith in me. but her comments were not undeserved. the whole thing was rather disturbing. there is something disconcerting about coming around a corner and finding your husband like this...

also each time i would get shot, i guess it upset me so much when i didn't know who the perp was that i would be screaming "who shot me? who shot me?!" while failing about. apparently as i was doing this, my nephew (with a military background) was shooting me repeatedly. the hysterical female...always an easy target.

then there was the realization in literally the last minute i was in the arena, that i had been holding the gun backwards the entire time. so, it is really hard to know how many of the times i was shot were other assassins, or the friendly fire of me just shooting myself. i knew i wouldn't do well at such an activity. but it was even worse than i thought. my trigger happy nephew got 8150. tate got 5600. my score?

you probably can't read that, but it reads 0025. in that last minute when i finally learned which way to shoot the gun, i hit a bonus target on the wall thus not ending the game with 0000. brilliant. if you own a gun shop, never never NEVER sell me a gun.

we had to hit the arcade too because you have to get tons and tons of tickets so they can award you worthless prizes, right? lulu had her own way of playing skee ball...

she shoots like her momma.

but she doesn't dance like her momma...

i don't know what version of ddr lulu thought she was doing, but that is definitely not the kind of dancing we want her doing. ever. it's only funny because she had no idea what she was doing.

though tate missed his birthday buddy, my sister carrie sent a text that was so precious...

i still love that tate and gunga share a bday. JOY trumps sorrow!" amen. there was sorrow at not having gunga with us. but mostly, there was joy...