First off even though this blog title sounds pretty dramatic I'd like to take a second and focus on my mom because this is actually a blog about her birthday...
I always knew my mom was a strong lady but her strength has been really been tested this year . Right off the bat this year my Dad had a trip in the ambo from his fall at work. She panicked, then paused and prayed. Then a month later Dad had his emergency brain surgery. Again...panicking, but mostly praying. She slept for a week on a couch in the ICU waiting room. If that ain't a crick in the back...? Dad just found out a few weeks ago that he has to have a complete shoulder replacement because he has virtually NO rotater cuff left & on the way to meet his surgeon to talk about his shoulder surgery he hurt his knee and now must have knee surgery and be completely healed before the shoulder replacement takes place. Looking down the road...months and months of more surgeries and physical therapy for my dad...which OF COURSE my mom will be right by his side.
On top of being his moral support and strength to realize that
'a break has to EVENTUALLY COME, Steve'...my Dad has also been unemployed for 10 months and mom has been working 50-60+ hour weeks to make sure all the bills are paid. AND STILL...after all this weighing on her heart day in and day out, she is one of the happiest people I know. You know what that is my friends? That's Jesus. So Happy Birthday Mom. 50 years is a long time to be so happy. My life surely wouldn't be the same without your cheery and positive disposition.
Moving on to the celebration portion of this Half a Century Feat that is my mother's 50th birthday dinner...[have I mentioned she turned the big 50? No? I didn't think so. She's 50! 50 years old ladies and gentleman!]I thought it would be nice if her immediate family got together [which is sometimes hard to organize] so I planned a fancy dinner at Tabor Hill. We all piled into cars and drove up into Michigan for our destination dinner. We got there 30 minutes before our reservation which I kept applauding my entire family, I can't believe we're early! This is freaking amazing!! I should call the local news station to let them know. We did the wine tasting [or sparkling juice tasting in my case] and went to the front desk to be seated. NOW here's where the story gets dramatic...I had made the reservations a week prior and was told we would be at two separate tables because our party was so large. We would be at a 8' round and a 6' round and the tables would be next to each other. It wasn't the perfect scenario...I would have liked to have been at one giant table but I asked if we'd be close enough to reach over and chat to the other table and she said 'Yes, they'll be next to each other.' So I was like...cool that works.
They go to seat our party of 14 and 8 people are seated at a long rectangular table in front of the fire place and the other 6 of us get put at a round table in the corner. Now if you were looking at a diagram of the table set up in the dining room TECHNICALLY the tables would be 'next' to each other...but there was a good 10' between our party. I immediately thought this is not what I was told. We're in Timbuktu over here.
I got a shot at mom's face and she looked totally confused and weirded out by the seating arrangement. I was a little confused and so was everyone else. We asked our waiter if we could move the table or pull more square tables together with the party of 8 portion of our party of 14 and we were told we had to go to management for that. Susanna, my brother's girl friend, has no problem getting things done so she went and found the manager. After being gone for a good 5 minutes she came back pissed and asked, 'She's not budging and saying you confirmed that two tables were acceptable." Well YA! Two tables that were actually NEXT to each other. So after the table of 8 and the table of 6 glanced back and forth at each other from afar and my mom still had that sad/disappointed 'what the heck' look on her face I decided to go talk to the manager myself. This is what I was told [kind of]...but definitely what I expected.
Kathy, the manger, [name dropping just in case you wanna call and complain...OH and the General Manager's name is Paul, he'll be getting his phone call from my husband today. :] kept repeating herself to me. "You confirmed that two tables were acceptable. I asked, 'You realize that this is a big event for us. We've all driven from out of town for this dining experience and one of our tables is in Timbuktu. Our party of 14 is a party of 8 and a party of 6! Two tables would be fine if they were actually NEXT to each other. Can't we please just move the round table close to the other table so we can feel like were one party??' Her answer to me??? 'The tables are where they are and they're NOT moving. I'm sorry.' Oooo, then I put my dukes up.
The whole time she's staring me back in the face saying, 'I'm sorry you misunderstood us. I see here you spoke with multiple people when creating/confirming your reservations so someone probably misled you..we told you the tables were ACROSS from each other and they can't be NEXT to each other because the noise level of a party of 14 gets too loud and disturbs the other guests." Oh! Oh! It's not that you CAN'T do it...it's that you WON'T do it. I guess the tab from a party of 14 wouldn't be high enough to accommodate us!?!? And there seriously were like 4 other tables in the whole dining room. Why didn't ya just tell me..."We don't do parties that large because of the noise level", that would have saved us all a big head ache. I mean, really lady! Do you have ANY customer service experience? You said it yourself that I must have been misled by someone I talked to. We're all here now...can you make it right?
What makes us all laugh looking back is we couldn't sit together because of the noise level yet across the room someone brought their toddler to this fine diner and the kid was scream at the top his lungs...at 7:30pm?!? Don't babies go to bed at 8?! Yet WE'RE the problem with this picture. I ended my conversation with her like this...'It's my mother 50th birthday dinner...we've been planning this for a month...try to make this work for us because we're on the verge of walking out.' And she ended it by saying, 'I understand you're upset. But that tables aren't moving'
So, long story really long. We left. Tabor Hill you can kiss your party of 14 tab goodbye. And you bet we'll talk bad about our experience to everyone we know. If we all tell five people what happened [I've already told like 20!]...and all those people tell a few more people...that's HUNDREDS of people which is far worse than eating a party of 14 tab.
While we wondered what we'd do for dinner now Andy stayed inside and tried to void my mom's gift cert we had gotten her and my brother called Villa Macri, which is only 5 minutes from where we all live. Go figure! His conversation went a little like this...'Hey Margy! It's Spencer. We're out celebrating my mom's 50th birthday and we all just walked out of Tabor Hill due to a bad experience...can you accommodate a party of 14...like, right now??' He said she was really excited and said that our table would be ready for us when we got there!
40 minutes later our entire family pulls up and can't help but notice the parking lot is jam packed and bushels of people are waiting for a chance to eat at this fine ristorante! We're all thinking, 'Are ya sure they can seat us??' We walk in, ask for the owner and we're taken to the wine cellar in the basement where we're seated at this HUGE table for 14! We had our own private server. They treated us with a free appetizer platter and mom got a bottle of wine on the house! I'm sure they were going bonkers upstairs [because there wasn't a table free in the whole house] but they made it work. We'll tell everyone we know how Villa Macri saved the day!
Although our evening was dramatic as all get out and nothing like we had planning, Mom said her birthday was perfect! 
I couldn't help but think about other babies in this world who go to bed hungry every night. Little boys like my little boy crying themselves to sleep from hunger pains. So many mothers can't walk into a kitchen and choose from a refrigerator full of food. I take stuff like that for granted everyday. I went to bed with a grateful heart and teary eyes for all those hungry babies.
The feast hall...before we slopped green bean casserole and gravy all over the white linens.
My mom came up with this great idea for a center piece. She bought fresh bananas, oranges, pears, apples, papaya and lemons to be the center piece. We sprinkled around some fall leaves, shelled nuts and candles. So beautiful! Martha Stewart would be proud.
Renae and Abby cleared off all the plates from the kid table and the grown up table [mean while the grown ups shared a bottle of 
We laughed...We cried...She hopped on the table and acted like a center piece.
We're going to a cocktail harvest party tomorrow night. Until then I'll be trying to devise a way to make 
p.s. Laurie, we left our milk cup in your fridge. 
