An 85th Birthday Surprise

This beautiful woman is my Grandma Putnam. And on July 6th she turned 85 years old. So we threw her a surprise birthday party!

 

While waiting for her to arrive at the church for the party, we hung out trying to keep all the kids entertained. We got the food ready, made birthday cards for my grandma, and let the kids play. Some of the kids passed the time lining up for turns having my uncle Kyle spin them around like a human helicopter.

When we got word that she was almost there, we gathered up the kids and waited in the cultural hall with the lights turned out. Luckily the glow from all the hand-held devices people had kept the room light enough that none of the kids were scared. In fact, several of them had fun hiding under the table waiting for her to arrive.

Getting her to the party was kind of a funny story. My aunt Kristine told my grandparents that she was going to take them shopping so that my grandma could find a new pair of shoes. The morning of the party, my sister, Melyssa, had already planned to cut her hair. So after she cut it, she styled it nicely for her and helped my aunt Kristine convince her to put on some make up and get looking nice to "go shopping." My grandpa (who was not in on the secret) grumbled through all of this and insisted that he was NOT going shopping with them. So when Melyssa had a moment alone with him, she let him know what was going on so that he could help get Grandma to the party at the church. My grandma was not exactly happy about going shopping either. She felt like she had too many other things to get done at home and she pretty grumpy when they left the house.

 

After leaving the house, Kristine told them that she had to stop at her church to check on some things for their ward BBQ later that evening. My grandma (still not wanting to be there) wanted to just wait in the car. But Grandpa (who now knew what was going on) told her that they should just go inside to wait. Which I think is funny because if you know my grandparents, it is usually my grandma who wants to go inside and my grandpa who would rather wait in the car. Needless to say, she was pretty surprised when she walked into the dark cultural hall and we were all waiting there when they turned on the lights. Then we sang happy birthday to her while she stood there with a big smile. It could probably go without saying that her grumpy mood was quickly gone.

 

While I'm on the subject of wonderful women having a birthday in July...the next weekend we celebrated my mom's birthday. The Sunday dinner we had as a family was not at all a surprise for her. But still, I hope we were able to help her feel special for her birthday.

Notice all the kids gathered around the cake as we sang happy birthday to her. My mom doesn't necessarily care about having a cake with candles, but she knows the kids love it. And she didn't want to put 55 candles on her cake. So instead she put on 11, one for each of her grandchildren.

So fun times were had as we celebrated the births of two of the greatest women I know!!!