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MIL's Birthday
May. 24th, 2026 06:54 amMay Family Visit Travelog #7
At the house · Sat 23 May 2026. 9pm.
We celebrate my mother-in-law's (MIL's) birthday with a party today. Her actual birthday was a few days ago, and she turned... well, I'll say she's in her 80s. Today, a Saturday, was more convenient for having friends and relatives visit, including friends and relatives from out of town. We celebrated with lunch out at a restaurant MIL (and FIL) enjoy and then came back to the house where we served cake and ice cream.
It wasn't a big group for the party, just 12 of us total including MIL and FIL. Among those attending:
We'd invited a few more who were unable to attend. 12 turned out to be a nearly perfect size, though, as the table at lunch wasn't overwhelming and everyone fit easily in the house for the cake-and-ice cream party. And MIL had more energy than we in the immediate family expected.
MIL herself had expected she'd only be able to handle two visitors at a time. Hawk and I built a plan around moving people between rooms so as not to overwhelm her. But then MIL sat down at the head of the dining room table and asked everyone to grab chairs and sit down with her. Not everyone sat at the same time; a lot of us had done a lot of sitting (especially those who'd driven or flown in) so we were happy to stand. And splitting ourselves between two rooms did work better for everyone anyway. And MIL enjoyed being able to talk to, like, four people at a time.
At the house · Sat 23 May 2026. 9pm.
We celebrate my mother-in-law's (MIL's) birthday with a party today. Her actual birthday was a few days ago, and she turned... well, I'll say she's in her 80s. Today, a Saturday, was more convenient for having friends and relatives visit, including friends and relatives from out of town. We celebrated with lunch out at a restaurant MIL (and FIL) enjoy and then came back to the house where we served cake and ice cream.
It wasn't a big group for the party, just 12 of us total including MIL and FIL. Among those attending:
- MIL's children and son-in-law (me!)
- MIL's sister and brother-in-law, who flew in from Chicago
- MIL's sister-in-law, who drove up from Virginia
- Long-term family friends who live nearby
- A long-term "our kids are in the same grade" friend who lives near Washington, DC. Funny story: MIL met her when they lived in the same neighborhood in the 1970s and were registering their oldest boys for kindergarten. Not only did they have kids starting school together, but when the admin instructed the parents to line up alphabetically by last name (seems like an awfully advanced task for kindergarten 🤣) they discovered they have the same last name! They've been friends ever since— which is now about 55 years.
We'd invited a few more who were unable to attend. 12 turned out to be a nearly perfect size, though, as the table at lunch wasn't overwhelming and everyone fit easily in the house for the cake-and-ice cream party. And MIL had more energy than we in the immediate family expected.
MIL herself had expected she'd only be able to handle two visitors at a time. Hawk and I built a plan around moving people between rooms so as not to overwhelm her. But then MIL sat down at the head of the dining room table and asked everyone to grab chairs and sit down with her. Not everyone sat at the same time; a lot of us had done a lot of sitting (especially those who'd driven or flown in) so we were happy to stand. And splitting ourselves between two rooms did work better for everyone anyway. And MIL enjoyed being able to talk to, like, four people at a time.
