Muench Family Happenings: Happy Birthday Mom! (by Hadden)

I (Steve) will do a bit of liberal translation of Hadden's thoughts since mostly he says things like, "Bwee, bwee, bwee" and "Ah-yee-ah". I'm sure he means something but we're never sure exactly what it is. Mostly we interpret it as permutations of "hungry", "tired", happy, sad and frustrated.

Well, Mom is 40 years old this month (on the 19th to be excact). Surprisingly, this has not changed my outlook on life much. Still pretty much overeating, crying when I'm tired and getting in to things I'm not supposed to. First, let's list my skills (hey, this is MY blog) that are new this month:

Crawling. That's a big one. Mom and Dad say that I crawl like a crab (I refuse to touch my left knee to the ground) but what do they know - I'm their first kid. Anyway, I leared how and Aunt Stephie and Uncle Richard's house in Santa Rosa while on a Microsoft recruiting trip with Mom a couple of weeks ago. She didn't let me do the interviews but I did tour Stanford with Grandma (they don't accept applications from my age group yet).
Cruising. This is what the so-called experts call it when you walk around by holding on to stuff. I'm pretty fast and can get through the house this way.
Clapping. I'm pretty good at clapping on demand. If you say "clap, clap, clap" in a sing-song style I may grace you with a few claps. You guys eat that stuff up.
Waving. I can wave with both hands and do the "queen's wave" (a slow rotation of the hand at the wrist). I think adults have limited their waving enjoyment by somehow limiting it to situations where someone is leaving or arriving. I often just like to wave at myself in my spare time.
Feeding myself. This rocks. Now I can finally try and feed myself the amount of food I think I deserve.
Chewing. This goes hand-in-hand with feeding myself. It seems like a lot of extra work that doesn't need to be included in the eating process but, hey, "when in Rome..."
Banging things. Give me one thing and I will bang it on something else. The louder the noise the better. You adults need to do better - I can't tell you how many things I've discovered that are not supposed to be banged against anything else. Totally lame. It seems you guys build lots of lame single-purpose non-durable items. That's gotta change.

Also, I must admit it's become hard to figure out what my real name is (Hadden) with all the nicknames Mom and Dad keep calling me. So far I've cataloged Cheech, Scooter, Flapjack, Meatball, Chunk, Mellonhead, Bwee Bwee, Ding-a-Ling, Ding-Ding, Stinky Pants (I hear this is a common baby nickname - I wonder why), Doots, Lil' Stinker.

Some of my new favorite things are electrical outlets and power chords. It's especially good if one is plugged into the other. I tend to make a beeline to them when set down. Perhaps it's my grandfather's influence - they call my name.

Okay, so back to the subject matter of the post. Mom hand a surprise party for her 40th birthday this month. I knew about it for something like 2 weeks but I didn't tell her. I was even quiet while dad was on the phone with mom and on his way to the party. There were lots of Mom's friends there and a few of mine too (Gavin, Madeline, Maggie, Alastair, Nels, Gabe to name a few).

(at Mom's surprise party with Karen and Angela)

Today we just got back from spending the weekend in Plain, WA in a cabin with the Goodchild/Cahill clan (not sure how to reference them since there are 2 last names) and my aunties Joanna and Karen. Lots of fun. I went sledding with mom and dad, took a bath with Alastair and Maggie, went on a sleigh ride, and played a lot in the cabin without breaking anything significant. All in all, a great weekend and a great birthday for Mom.