Corey's 40th Birthday

On March 11, 1969 my future husband was born into this world. 

On Wednesday, we celebrated him as he turned 40. 

Last year on Corey's birthday as I thought about the approach of "the big-four-oh", I began to brainstorm what I could do to make it special. As you stay-at-home moms might be able to relate --- Because I have no income, I always have limited money to spend on my husband... and he is the one that has earned the money that I do have for his presents. If I didn't insist that we honor each other with gifts, he would forgo receiving gifts at all. It is a bit of an awkward thing to be essentially buying your own presents, I guess... So I had this idea. If I saved a little here and a little there for the span of time between his 39th and 40th birthdays, I might be able to come up with enough to give him an unexpected gift. And I had a specific gift in mind. Something that he had mentioned several times but would not have spent money on on his own. As the year crept by, I pocketed every little bit of money that I could. I had a garage sale. I sold things at resale shops. And I collected all the spare change that I could get my hands on. He never noticed the missing money or asked me to spend the money that I had come up with in other ways.

Last week, the kids and I had a big coin-rolling party, and after a few cramps in our hands that were covered in money-filth, we proudly stacked up our many coins and few bills and headed to the bank.
When we walked through the door of the bank, the teller looked up and saw us and almost yelled, "Oh, lord!" in a slightly annoyed voice. I was taken back and asked her if banks still accepted cash money... she conceded that they, in fact, did and proceeded to count the rolls upon rolls of coins that were in our very heavy boxes. When it was all said and done, I was pretty proud of the fruits of my labor and could not wait until Corey's birthday rolled around, so I could surprise him. I even came up with a little poem that I stuck in a card that clued him into what I had been doing in preparation for his 40th birthday all year long...

Last year on your birthday,

you were turning 39.

I thought to myself,

“A trip for him would be divine.”

But as you might remember,

I’m a mommy with no income,

So on that day a year ago I said,

“If I want money, I’ll have to save me some.”

So I started doing just that

on a day in March ‘08.

And on a day last week,

I took my money to the bank.

The teller was a bit surprised to see the rolled up coins, 

but when she gave me those crisp bills, I was overjoyed.

So, here you have it, Mr. P,

A gift from me to you.

Now we can go on a get-away,
And take a break from this zoo.

I think that he was truly surprised, and we are anxiously planning a trip to the beach sometime in the next couple of months. 

I found this cute passport cover to put the money in and luggage tags to match.

The kids had fun looking online for trip ideas with him.

Corey also received other cards and gifts from the family...

Jack's card included hand-made coupons that he created for his daddy.

Usually, if we give cards in our family they are homemade, but this year I took the kids to the store and let them choose one to give Corey. Cooper's is a dog in a spaceship that says "To A Special Boy".  :)
His other big present from me was a book of letters from our families that I had been working on collecting for him for the last several weeks. The little book is full of words of love and encouragement and memories for Corey. I think that he really liked it and hopefully he will look back over the kind words often and remember how he is loved.