It's official: I'm in my late twenties. As of yesterday, I'm now 27 -- you round up; no more mid-twenties for me. The day started off very promising when Mike brought me breakfast in bed. It was excellent except for one thing -- he forgot my dark chocolate Hershey Kiss. 5 1/2 years of marriage!! Does he know me at all? (Oh, don't worry, I didn't suffer for long -- I thanked him for the meal, sang its praises and requested my chocolate. We both realize that it was good for our marriage that I was locked in the hospital last spring and didn't do my bed rest at home). Shortly after breakfast, Matthew came groggily out of his room and sang happy "berfday" to mommy. I got a HUGE stack of illustrations done by my first born -- he has become quite the artist. Most of the pictures were truck-themed. Some included a snake (a straight line) under the truck and a few had tweezers in the picture (huh! go figure). One picture was of a sword and "thunder." The kid is a genius that he can capture a visual for a "loud, explosive, resounding noise produced by the explosive expansion of air heated by a lightning discharge." (Thank you, Dictionary.com). Way to think outside the box! My personal favorite was a picture of a "bug eating nector" from a very detailed flower. He really has gotten quite good.

I then got to open my present from the Martin Boys -- a cute, sleek and very sassy...LAPTOP! Yes, I'm an official writer-wanna-be now, with my very own on-the-go computer. Of course, my first question to Mike was, "Can I decorate it...put stickers on it and make it a little more girlie?" I'm very excited about it. A laptop to me means that I'm all the more committed to my dream of being a writer when I grow up! And I have happy [delusional] thoughts of sitting in cafes in Paris, sipping strong coffee out of tiny, little cups and writing award-winning after award-winning works of literature masterpieces. Would it be masterpiec-i? Masterpi?

Mike went to work (in order that he can bring home the bacon; I bring home the bacon bits) while the boys and I went to a lovely birthday lunch at my parents' house. They picked up on my clear and blatant hints for some flowers for my garden. They got me a few of my very favorites: a hydrangea bush and a few blue Lithadora groundcovers. Whenever I'm planting things in my yard I secretly hear the poor flowers crying out in fear, "No! Please...anywhere but here! Help. I need attention. Love. Water. Someone to actually care properly for me!" (Look, I said that I hear them, I never admitted to being crazy enough to talking back to my plants; it might help calm their spirits though).

Not only is our yard turning into a place of botanical extravagance, it is also slowly becoming a freakin' wildlife preserve. I made mention a while back about our resident bunny. Yes, as we all know with rabbits, rarely will we find just one. They mate like...bunnies. We've been seeing Mr. and Mrs. Rabbit and various offspring bunnies more and more frequently on the Martin Homestead. And, let's face it, I realize that rabbits may not qualify for real "wildlife" but for this suburban-dwelling, city-girl, it's very exciting. But the excitement is definitely picking up.

Yesterday, after dinner, Mike was heading out to the grocery store. He'd been gone all of 30 seconds when he called to tell me to look outside. There were three ducks right by the family room window. These weren’t just any three ducks, and they weren’t just leisurely lounging on our lawn. Please allow me to expound. There was a bizarre mallard love-triangle unfolding in our front yard. I immediately did what any mature 27 year-old woman would do in this situation; I ran and got the camera, the phone, and climbed up onto the coffee table to have a better view. Then, I called the first people I think of when I need advice; my parents.
I gave them an overview of the situation. (Three ducks going crazy in our front yard: two males and one female. I don’t know who’s to blame. And I don’t know who is most deserving of her attention, but they’re really fighting over her). Dad made a comment that chances are good that her actual mate wasn’t even involved in the scandal – he was at home watching the ducklings while she was out gallivanting around. (So, it’s her fault, huh? She can’t help that she’s a hot chick and can really shake her tail feather?)! Occasionally I had to interrupt my parents’ views on duck-mating rituals to yell things out the window at the two bickering boy ducks like, “Hey! That’s not very nice…Why must you be so aggressive?...Use your words…Why can’t we all just get along?”

Pretty quickly things turned from bad to worse, one of the males tried to mount the female and then the other male was trying to mount the first dude duck. I heard myself shout, “Ahh! He’s mounting her! Wait! He’s mounting him!” Mom suggested I go outside and attempt to scare them away since my yells were obviously not working. Then I proclaimed, “They’re having a threesome in my front yard!” I can say with about 99.9% certainty that this is the first (and dear God, help me; hopefully the last) time I’ve ever said anything like that...ever…especially to my parents. This was just too much wildlife-nature show for this Catholic girl.
I headed out the front door with camera in hand, but as soon as I walked out, the startled lovers took off. “That’s right!” I shouted something like, “Take your sick duck-lust elsewhere!”
This afternoon, as I worked out in the yard, planting my birthday hydrangea bush, I heard quacking overhead. I looked up and saw three ducks fly by. They’re still going strong.

In conclusion, my 27th birthday was just ducky.