Awesome Friends

A month ago or so, I was talking to my oldest sister. Our calls are usually brief, since she's not anything like me on the phone. Birthdays were mentioned, and she sighed "yeah, I'll be 50 this year". We grew up with pretty much no celebration of a birthday. It was generally just another day. That is why my kids get some sort of recognition for birthdays - because I always wanted just a little something, even if it was my choice of dinner and a box mix cake. So, I set out on a mission to make my sister's 50th birthday anything but 'just another day', or just any other birthday. I called Sis's friend to conspire with her about things. I originally wanted to reserve a room at a buffet place and just tell everyone to pay their own way in, meet us in the back room and don't worry about bringing any gifts. Sis has no room in her small house anyway for a lot of stuff. Well I got nowhere with the buffet places because we wanted the back room on a weekend (their busy days) plus since her birthday is the day after Easter this year, it was EASTER weekend to boot. They don't like to reserve those rooms till it's bedtime for the kids on a school night. Old people, preggos, and skinny folks can't wait till 8 PM to eat dinner without repercussions. Back to square one. Someone's house. Sis's husband wasn't exactly prime host material, but he would prove to be a good co-conspirator. My house - we have boxes piled up everywhere in expectation of moving in a few months when a better fitting house finds us. Sis's friend is my hero. She went to bat and opened her house. I was put in charge of gathering family members, she gathered some friends. Then to boot, she slaved over the stove making lasagna. Now most people would just open the freezer case at the store and get the big pan of frozen stuff. For the love of Sis, her friend made this lasagna from SCRATCH. Foodgasmic, gooey, sloppy, falling apart on the plate, honestly home made lasagna. I'm drooling just typing it. Sis was told it was Easter dinner with her friend's home made lasagna. Sis was late getting there, because she thought they were just going to put the lasagna in the oven at 2 and go to Walmart. Every time they get together, they go to Walmart, even if they don't buy anything. Well when sis FINALLY got there, almost an hour late she was completely shocked to see everyone there. We parked at the neighbor's house and Sis was oblivious to driving right past our cars. So, I had the camera and Devildog was poised at the door to yank it open so the rest of us could yell "SURPRISE!" It was so worth every bit of work. Sis deserves a kick butt birthday, even if it's just once in her life. She's a kick butt sister. She has some seriously KICK BUTT friends. And I can't say enough about how her friends just utterly and completely ROCK! The R's are both heroes because their teamwork amazes me. I can only hope that one day I can repay them for letting me con them into doing this. I didn't do nearly as much as I wanted to share the workload. Friend took on much more than she should have - all for the love of Sis.
So, for all that, she's my hero, and an awesome friend.