Life with the Ball's: Happy Birthday, Ethan!

A long time ago, Ethan turned 14! I wanted his day to feel celebratory despite the fact that we were quarantined and all fun had been cancelled. I came up with a pretty good idea though. I sent him on a scavenger hunt around town for his birthday presents. I had hoped to have Marcus drive him around which would give Marcus something to do too, but the DMV closed before he could take his driving test. If there's one thing I've learned from this pandemic it's to be flexible so I adjusted and decided Marcus would drive Ethan around while I sat in the back saying nothing, not even complaining about the loud music they played. I wanted them to feel like I wasn't there and it was fun for me to be a fly on the wall and see these brothers in action. It was a lot of fun! I quickly made up a few clues and hid a couple presents at different locations with the help of neighbor Barb (I think she was happy to have an excuse to leave her house).

Ethan's first gift was a Starbucks gift card that he was supposed to use to buy three drinks (not coffee, of course) for him, Marcus and Randy and then deliver Randy his drink for the next clue. We pulled up to Starbucks and the drive-thru was closed. Ugh! But I'm flexible so I told him to give me a head start and we ran up to Randy's office where Ethan received his new iPhone. Ethan has been impatiently begging and waiting for the day when he could have a smart phone to replace his "dumb calculator phone." I haven't seen Ethan smile so big in a long time when he opened the box.

From there we went to the library where he eventually found a gift that I had carefully hidden behind a huge rock in hopes it wouldn't get stolen before we could get there. Next we went to McDonald's drive-thru to pick up lunch, where Marcus proceeded to order using his best British/Australian accent (but I didn't say a word even though it was super annoying).

The next clue sent us to our church parking lot to eat lunch and get the next gift.

'Thanks for the lava lamp, Grandpa!"

From the church we drove down to Issaquah to a bakery where he went inside and asked if they had an order for him. The baker handed him a box with a HUGE donut cake inside.

We drove back home with the sun shining, music blaring, and the boys having a great time together and for a little while all thoughts about the pandemic were far from our minds. It felt glorious and was the best part of my day.

The donut cake made up of 3 giant donuts and large cinnamon stick donuts for the fries on the side. And yes, that's real bacon on the sides to make the "burger."