Growing Up

This week is a week of growth.

Isaac turned 10. Double digits! It doesn't seem that long ago that he was in preschool with me.

For his birthday, his dad gave him the choice of a new fuzzy pet (he got a sweet mouse last year that died after a month, leaving him heart broken) or Rock Band for the PS2.

We were at Toys R Us when Reed called him, and the poor guy couldn't decide, so I told Reed to let him sleep on it. The next morning Isaac still didn't know what to choose.

The next day, Reed and I surprised Isaac at school by bringing donuts for his class and a birthday balloon.

School was almost out, so we got the boys out early. I told Ike we were thinking about gerbils and his face just lit up. "Yeah! I'd like the gerbils!."

"Instead of Rock Band?"

"Maybe I can get that later."

So we headed off to Petsmart. The thing that frustrates me about Petsmart is that I don't think the people really know what they're talking about. I did some online research about gerbils, and one of the things the American Gerbil Society says is to NOT get them a wire cage. They will spend all their time chewing on the bars and rubbing their little noses raw.

So we're looking at the gerbils (they only had two, and you need to buy them in pairs) and the girl says, "we've got some great cages over here!" and points right at the wire cages. At that point, I know she doesn't really know much about gerbils, and she confirms that when she pulls one out to show us and she's holding it in her hand by the tail. You never hold a gerbil by the tail because breaks easily.

Undaunted, we start looking around the store for supplies and find a nice 10 gallon aquarium, but they're out of wire lids...a necessity. So another employee calls around and tells us that we've got one on hold at a different store. After she leaves, I ask Reed which store. "The Bountiful one, I think," he tells me. He asks the girl if it was Bountiful and she says yes...so off we go.

When we get up there, everyone's hungry, so Isaac chooses Pei Wei for his birthday lunch. I get a fortune that tells me my judgement is flawed, and Reed gets one telling him that his finances are in trouble. Suddenly we're wishing Isaac had wanted McDonalds and a Transformer for his birthday.

Anyway, we get to the Bountiful Petsmart, and can't find the wire lids anywhere. Reed asks an employee about the one "on hold" and...wouldn't you know it but no one at that store remembers talking to anyone about an aquarium and wire lid.

Grrrr. I realize that the girl probably called the Fort Union Store, which happens to be 40 minutes in the opposite direction.

However, the manager probably sees my eyes going red and offers us the Critter Cage (which is basically the exact same set up, but at almost double the price) for the same cost as the aquarium and lid would be. Score!

So we went over to the small pet cages...and can't find any gerbils.

The girl says, "Oh, we don't have any to sell right now."

You have got to be kidding me.

"But...we have some adoption ones in the back."

Psheeew.

"Well.....can we see them?"

"I'll have to get them down," she says. Get them "down?" Where are they storing these poor gerbils, anyway?

Apparently, if someone mis-sexes a gerbil and they end up in the wrong cage, babies ensue. Who knew? And since the babies aren't part of the store inventory, they don't sell them, they give them away. Which saves us $20 dollars. Take THAT, fortune cookie!

I'm a little concerned because the babies must not have had a lot of human contact, but they're young enough (5 weeks) that I think it won't be a problem.

So, we left with two black and white baby gerbils named Whiskers and Benji. Benji, amusingly enough, is named after Benji Schwimmer from the first season of So You Think You Can Dance because my son thinks the gerbil is hyper, just like him.

We get home and get the gerbils set up in their new abode, and then head to Grandma Nancy's for dinner and (cheese)cake. My mom always does fun party decorations when we have birthdays at her house. Prior to Isaac's birthday, she called and asked me if he liked any superheros. The only ones I could think of were Transformers, but apparently Transformer Birthday supplies are impossible to find. So she settled on animals, which fits my cute boy to a T.

Reed tells Breanna that if she wants to pay for half of Rock Band, we'll go get it anyway. (It was on sale for $50 off at Toys R Us.) My dear husband is a Rock Band fanatic, as is Bree, so the deal is struck and we run out to pick it up before they close. But first we sing "Happy Birthday" to my sweet boy, who picked cheesecake for his birthday cake, and Caramel Stampede for his ice cream because he thinks it's cool that it has little caramel-filled chocolate cows in it.

Happy Birthday Isaac! We love you!

In other news, Sadie started Kindergarten today. I held it together, but just barely. My little bug was so excited to get there, that when we were waiting in line to have her get unloaded from the car, she kept saying, "Why aren't the cars MOVING????"

Here's some picks of my bug on her first day of school.

Yep. There's been a lot of growing up at my house this week.