Happy 70th to my Dad!

This year my dad turned 70.  Sometime during the year he mentioned to my sister and my mom that he had never had a birthday party so we thought this should be the year.  We started planning for it in the summer and let me just say that it was sooo hard to keep a secret!  Really, for a man who can't hear anything when we are talking directly to him, he sure picked up on a lot of whispers (oh and a few emails that shouldn't have been read by him - mom, we still think you need a separate email account!).  After months of planning (and cover-ups when Dad questioned us) that party came out a success.  The big surprise was that everyone came out for it.  Sarah and her family from Maryland, Megan and her family from California and Joseph from Spain, we missed you Kathryn, Joey, Rue and James (when will we ever get the entire family together?!)

I like themed parties, so I suggested a crossword party theme (lots...most of ideas taken from here) and everyone agreed!  It was so fun to work with my mom making the decorations.  

Sarah made a fun crossword with clues all about my dad.  He got up while everyone was eating and shared the answers along with lots of fun stories from his past. 

Megan made the beautiful invites and blew up old pictures of my dad to decorate one wall.  It was fun to see the old pictures, some of which I'd never seen before.  She, Emily and Sarah decorated the room during the day.

I was in charge of the desserts.  We got a delicious cake from Costco (seriously, who knew Costco could make such a good cake).  I made a quadruple batch of sugar cookies and frosted them to look like crossword puzzles.  Megan and my mom made peanut butter squares.  Delicious!

All of Dad's siblings came to join us (we missed his sister Gayle who was visiting her son in Arizona), lots of my mom's cousins, and friends from all over.  Because my dad thought his surprise was that all his kids were coming for Thanksgiving he really ended up being surprised and genuinely happy that he had a party thrown all for him!

Here are a few pictures of all the people who came to wish him a happy birthday. 

 

Happy Birthday Dad.  You are the most helpful, kind, and great dad I could ask for!  Thanks for teaching me all kinds of things about renovating homes, taking me on awesome camping trips and great hikes all over Utah!  Thanks for being an awesome Morfar.  Amelia LOVES you and loves to play downstairs with you and all the toys.