{"id":7209,"date":"2013-01-01T10:57:10","date_gmt":"2013-01-01T17:57:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/?p=7209"},"modified":"2013-01-04T19:54:06","modified_gmt":"2013-01-05T02:54:06","slug":"a-new-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/?p=7209","title":{"rendered":"My New Year Is Better Than Your New Year."},"content":{"rendered":"

I haven’t checked my horoscope for 2013.\u00a0 But I’m guessing that I’m in for a good year.\u00a0 Because last night The Other Half and I celebrated our anniversary.\u00a0 We were celebrating a day early, since we were actually married on New Year’s Day.\u00a0 Which was poor planning on our part.\u00a0 Note to all marriage planners out there—-anyone who gets married on New Year’s Day should be prepared to always celebrate it at home.\u00a0 Because restaurants aren’t open on New Year’s Day.\u00a0 At least not the ones where you’d want to celebrate an important date.<\/p>\n

So The Other Half and I headed out on New Year’s Eve for dinner.\u00a0 At 6:00pm.\u00a0 We drank sweet tea and Diet Coke.\u00a0 We used a gift card to pay.\u00a0 Afterwards we went to Target.\u00a0 And then we went back to my parents’ house to pick up the kids.\u00a0 At 8:30pm.<\/p>\n

Yep.\u00a0 That’s the way 14 years rolls, people.<\/p>\n

But this morning when I finally sat up in bed, I was in for a big surprise.\u00a0 The Other Half was already gone to work.\u00a0 And the house was mysteriously quiet.\u00a0 Very quiet.<\/p>\n

No talking.\u00a0 No fighting.\u00a0 No television.\u00a0 No sounds from the iPad.<\/p>\n

Huh, I thought as I headed down the stairs.\u00a0 Maybe the kids were finally tired.\u00a0 After 2 weeks of vacation—–going to the movies, shopping, bowling, driving around to see Christmas lights, hiking in the woods, attending bonfires, going on sleepovers, having sleepovers, baking, decorating, playing basketball, rearranging their rooms, hunting, being sick, getting better, making ice cream, perusing the used book store, and eating out, eating out, eating out——maybe the kids were FINALLY tired and slept in.<\/p>\n

Nope.<\/p>\n

Because as I came around the corner of the stairs, 4 kids jumped out from behind the couch and screamed, “Happy anniversary!”<\/p>\n

Which almost made me scream, too.<\/p>\n

Then they showed me the breakfast they had made for me—cheesy bacon eggs (under the silver bowl to keep warm), pancakes, toast, and coffee.\u00a0 All on a white tablecloth.<\/p>\n

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Plus they had cleaned up all the dishes and pots used to make breakfast.\u00a0 And swept the floor.\u00a0 Because they know I hate to come downstairs to clumps of dog fur all over the place every morning.<\/p>\n

And they made a banner for me and The Other Half.<\/p>\n

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Please note some of the added sayings:<\/p>\n

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OMG!\u00a0 I am totally saving this sign for when they are all teenagers.\u00a0 Then when they hate me, I am going to parade around the house, wearing it like a sarong.\u00a0 Probably.\u00a0 Maybe.\u00a0 If I feel like it.<\/p>\n

I did have to share my celebratory breakfast with the puppies, though.\u00a0 Because it’s their birthday.\u00a0 They are 4 years old now.\u00a0 For which they earned an egg and a chew stick candle in their dog chow.<\/p>\n

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Although no matter how old or how big they get….<\/p>\n

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….they will still look like this to me.<\/p>\n

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They will always be the kids’ “puppies.”<\/p>\n

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(P.S. who needs Instagram <\/a>when you used to have an old crappy APS camera?\u00a0 No fancy filter needed to “age” your photos.)<\/p>\n

It’s a shame The Other Half had to work and couldn’t enjoy the festivities.\u00a0 But the kids have already planned to make him cheesy dogs and a pecan pie as an anniversary dinner.\u00a0 Which means 2 awesome things:<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 I don’t have to cook or clean up dinner tonight.<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0 I don’t have to start my diet until tomorrow.<\/p>\n

Sweet!\u00a0 Because while I was digging in the cabinet for some more zero calorie sweetener to go with my Almond Joy flavored coffee creamer, I stumbled upon a bag of leftover Food Lion brand copy cat girl scout cookies.\u00a0 The good ones—–thin mints, peanut butter patties and Samoas.\u00a0 None of that waste-of-calories shortbread stuff.\u00a0 Score!<\/p>\n

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Look, I don’t care who you are or what you’re doing.\u00a0 There’s no way your New Year started off better than mine.\u00a0 No freaking way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I haven’t checked my horoscope for 2013.\u00a0 But I’m guessing that I’m in for a good year.\u00a0 Because last night The Other Half and I celebrated our anniversary.\u00a0 We were celebrating a day early, since we were actually married on New Year’s Day.\u00a0 Which was poor planning on our part.\u00a0 Note to all marriage planners […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7209","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7209"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7209\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7288,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7209\/revisions\/7288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}