Skates the Wolf & Birthday Fun

We had what we agreed might be our favorite Chicago birthday for Drew this past week. He usually puts pressure on me months in advance to NOT plan anything... I suppose that should make my life easier but being the social animal I am, I feel much less stress with a birthday coming up knowing I've organized a nice gathering, complete with party hats, blowers, gift bags and... of course... plenty of cake.

This year I went ahead & invited a few friends to join us for Happy Hour at the Straits' & a Wolves hockey game. Nicky (top left--and yes, she's quite pregnant) has her birthday the day before Drew's so we celebrated both of their beautiful lives (they even shared candles to blow out). We enjoyed all sorts of hors d'oeuvres here at home followed by a raucous game.Eric took the time to educate me on the rules of the game, as the one & only time I'd been to a hockey game was forever ago, with the Lutheran church's junior high youth group. Can't say I remembered much. BUT boy do I know now! From high sticking to icing, I'm getting this game down.

Skates the Wolf entertained us between each period... and there was a blimp (??still confused by that??). Very small children wearing very large pads playing with very large sticks also came out onto the ice between periods... we enjoyed watching the smallest children trying to keep up. Okay, that's not true. I mostly enjoyed watching them try & break in with the larger kids crowding the puck & spinning in circles because they weren't strong enough to push themselves along wearing all that gear & then falling over & then falling over again. I know. I'm a bad person. But it was cute.

Happy birthday, my dear Drew, and happy birthday, our dear Nicky! And thanks to Jenna, Nick & Eric for celebrating with us.