Each March, Joshua and I share our birthday week. This year we enjoyed a special outing together, because my Dad and his wife drove down from the Bay Area to take us both to Disneyland. It was my first trip back to the theme park in 23 years, and Joshua's first visit ever.The major highlights for Joshua were "shooting bad guys" on the Buzz Lightyear ride with Grandpa (twice) and being selected from the audience to participate in Star Wars Jedi Padawan Training, which included fighting Darth Maul with a lightsaber on stage. Disneyland also has a tradition that when you're wearing a birthday button, every employee who sees you is to wish you an enthused "Happy Birthday!" Joshua reveled in all of this unexpected attention.
This year it was Joshua's turn for a birthday party with his friends (we trade this privilege each year). He chose the theme of soccer, which was little surprise since he's enamored with the sport and just started AYSO again. We invited seven of his friends to come in their soccer jerseys for a soccer scrimmage on a sunny, crisp Sunday afternoon. The game was held at the local elementary school (at one point it was all of the boys against Jochen!) and then we walked back to our house to share cake and ice cream and open gifts. A simple but meaningful celebration.
Yet there were some minor challenges beforehand. Joshua decided that he absolutely wanted rainbow sherbert ice cream for his birthday. That's why on Saturday, he and Jochen walked down to our local Vons to pick up ice cream. However, the only size available in that flavor was a hefty one-and-a-half gallon tub. They lugged the entire tub of ice cream all the way back home.
Fast forward to Saturday evening when I went to Book Club at 7:30 and Jochen took on the task of putting both boys to bed. First Toby, then Joshua. In our family, the way it works best is to read, sing, and pray with each boy separately before tucking them in for the night. This works out great when there are two of us, but is logistically tougher when only one parent is home. Suffice to say that Jochen thought Toby was safely tucked into his bed when he turned out the lights and left to go read stories with Joshua.
For those who know our family, you can probably guess what happened next.
After putting Joshua to bed, Jochen took another peek into Toby's room (where all was well), and then calmly headed downstairs. By sheer luck, he happened to enter the livingroom, where he spotted something unusually large peeking out behind one of the chairs. As suspected, the huge tub of ice cream was on the floor, ajar, with a spoon still in it and a fair amount of orange sherbert missing.Somehow, Toby managed to slip downstairs, hoist this heavy tub out of the freezer, open it up and dig into the frozen treat with his spoon. Then, he just as quietly returned to his room. Fortunately, at four-and-a-half, he's not so good at covering his tracks and we've learned to look for signs that something is amiss.
After placing the ice cream back in the freezer, Jochen's next step was to devise a vice system for keeping the fridgerator and freezer double doors closed and the ice cream safe from pilfering-- at least until Joshua's party.
We're quite certain Toby made another try at the ice cream, though we didn't witness it. His habit is to hop out of bed at 5:00-5:30 a.m. and roam the kitchen before we're even awake. I imagine he was quite bewildered by the locked freezer. Fortunately, this left plenty of sherbert leftover for those who came to Joshua's party.
