So I realize this is a little late because my birthday was February 9^th but I have been so stinking busy that I haven’t had time to blog about it. Excuse the absence but hopefully this extremely long post will make up for it.

Alrighty… so I was supposed to have a partah the Sunday before my birthday, my b-day being on a Monday, but almost everyone I invited[including me] was sick  so we decided to cancel and have everyone over the next Friday night. I had the whole A team and Hannah come over and spend the night Friday, and then we hung out until later Saturday afternoon. This is a mostly complete account of our activities.

We started the party after basketball practice that afternoon, so everyone was at my house around 3 or 4ish. Coach Polly was going to come over and talk to us a little bit before we ate about some of our last few games, she had told me earlier that day that she couldn’t be there long because she had a last minute dinner to cook for. [she’s a chef] so she came over and talked and around 5 she told us she had to get her stuff out and prep some food at my house before she left. Haha, turned out she was actually cooking dinner for US and so we had a blast that night helping her make Grilled Chicken Alfredo, Rolls, Artichoke and Spinach dip, Asparagus, Bruschetta, and amazing salad. She also sautéed some mushrooms but no one except her ate them. While everything was in the ovens we played Catchphrase, that being the only thing I had requested to do, I really wanted to play that game! So then dinner was ready and all us gals sat at the table and started on the salad and coach came in with a bowl of mushrooms and was eating them and we teased her about it, none of us like mushrooms. Well halfway through our salad, coach starts coughing a bunch but we had all been sick so no one really paid attention to it. Then she spills her tea and starts apologizing over and over, trying to clean it up, coughing all the while, and suddenly she groans and grabs her stomach. She’s crying now and she stumbles away from the table and cries out, gasping for breath and clutching her side. Then she falls to the ground and stops crying out and just lies there. Mom rushes in and starts patting her face, “Polly? Polly can you hear me? Polly! Are you ok?” Mrs. Cobb runs in and my mom glances up with a look of shock and tells her she can’t find a pulse. I am FREAKING OUT and all of the girls are just looking on with disbelief and horror on their faces, my mom yells “Jeff!... JEFF!!!!” and then Claire and Jessica run for him and grab his arms, “Mr. Frankland… something’s wrong with coach… hurry!” and he runs in and kneels down by her. Mackenna stands up and red-faced she chokes out “I’ll go call my dad!” her dad is a doctor. Jessica screams “What’s he going to do?!?!?” Sarah and Hannah are staring at coach with huge eyes. Mom tells Mrs. Cobb that they should move her into the living room so they grab her arms and start tugging. Jessica runs beside them. “I know CPR!” She had tears running down her face. Claire, Sarah, Kelci, Hannah, Jordan and myself run into the living room holding back sobs. Mackenna is on the phone. “Dad, she’s not breathing, Mrs. Frankland can’t find a pulse… we don’t know what to do! … 911? Should I call 911?” She gets off the phone and runs in. I’m still stunned. I killed my coach at my birthday party… is the only thought that goes through my head. My mom looks up and sees us. “Go back into the dining room girls. All of you… now.” We stumble back to our seats. Jessica puts her head into her hands and sobs. Kelci is red-faced and Jordan looks dazed. Hannah and Sarah avoid my eyes and Mackenna and Claire stare at their plates. My brother walks in. he turns from the table and walks the computer in our office. Reaches for the mouse, and clicks. Suddenly the room is filled with the Dragnet theme and everyone looks around. What’s going on? My dad walks in regally, dressed in a sports coat and a Sherlock Holmes style hat. His eyes look serious. “There has been a murder… and you are all suspects.” Jessica groans and buries her head again. I’m a little ticked off. What the heck is going on?!?!? I realize no one looks shocked anymore. Instead the look at me with secret smiles playing at the corners of their mouths. It takes me about 10 minutes, but I finally realize my parents set up a murder mystery for my birthday in which my coach was killed. Mackenna’s dad, Dr. Jones had talked to my parents about plans for my birthday and when he heard that my mom was planning on buying a murder mystery set he begged them to let him write one for me. I have never had more fun at a birthday party. Not only was the mystery very well put-together, it was personal! Coach was killed and we all had secrets about one another that helped us determine who did it. We even had different names taken from our real ones. Mine was Dani Sue Perstar. It was so so sooooo much fun! Coach came in and watched us dig out the culprit dressed in a pair of Micaela’s dress-up fairy wings. Wondering about Jessica’s great acting? Turns out, the original plan was to do a murder lunch instead of dinner on Saturday instead of Friday. So no one was expecting it when it happened even though all of the girls knew about it. Jessica didn’t realize what was going on and was as freaked out for real as I was. She forgot that her mom told her about the murder mystery and thought the whole thing was for real. Poor thing… it was so much fun though! Coach was amazing! I really thought she had died… well it ended up that Hannah… poor Hannah was the culprit. I had been sad [in the plot] because coach had yelled at me during a practice and made me cry [which was true! The yelling and crying part, not the mad part] and when I told Hannah she was furious at coach and so she decided to get back at her for being so mean to me by picking some wild mushrooms and giving them to coach, telling her she got them at a store. Coach “cooked them” and when she ate them she was poisoned and died. Dr. Jones did so great writing it! I appreciate it so much. He was great.  I really have never had more fun in my life. It was awesome. So then after all that we opened presents, or I actually opened presents,  and then we took a late night walk, but it ended up being too cold to stay out long, and we walked back to the house, very quickly once Hannah pointed out the fact that our house looks ironically like the house in Signs… Then we came back and turned on my new Family Force 5 CD and had a jam session until Sarah had to leave. She couldn’t spend the night. Then we all chilled in the living room and watched random stuff, finishing up with Madagascar 2, at least that’s when I woke up haha. Then we all headed upstairs and crashed in our school room. It was the only room big enough to fit us all. We spread out a bunch of sleeping bags and my new down comforter and fell asleep, with Mackenna sleeping on the couch in there. She had dibs. We woke up around 10ish, Claire had to leave, and ate some sweet rolls coach Polly had made us for breakfast. Then we chilled, kind of in that slumber party stupor you know, and decided to have an upside-down Wii- tennis tournament. Now THAT was fun. Then we took everyone home that afternoon and then it was all over. Defiantly the best party I’ve ever had. Ahhh… it was so fun.

So that’s the birthday story. It was great.

I got the red down comforter I wanted for my birthday, and also a new phone!!! It’s an LG lotus, and I’ve named it Cadyn because it means Companion. It’s pretty amazing. I had a great birthday.

Another tidbit of good news, The Paris Lady Warriors placed First in the T-Cal Tournament, and in the ladies Free-Throw contest. We are the champions! We also went to state, that’s where I’ve been all weekend, but we didn’t place. It’s actually very confusing, because the team we were scheduled to play didn’t show so it was a forfeit and it jacked up the schedule and we didn’t place when we should have. But it’s ok because all of our parents are a little ticked and many letters are being sent. Hehe. But  hey! In our last game of the season I played better than I ever have. I had 5 points, 8 rebounds, 5 steals, and I fouled out of the game in the last quarter. I was satisfied. And poor Mackenna hit her bruised elbow on the ground hard and almost broke it. We had to go get it x-rayed after the game. She couldn’t even play the rest of the game after she hit it. She had bruised it bad a couple games earlier and she hit it in just the right spot. But it wasn’t broken, to her disappointment haha. Just very badly bruised. Well, It was a disappointing end to the season, because we could have easily gotten first in state. But we did win first in T-Cal and the free-throw contest so I’m pretty happy. I’ll be glad to not have basketball all the time like we were, but I’ll miss it too… I’m not sure if I’ll be back next year or not… It’s a big commitment so I need to think about it.

I’m posting pictures on Picasa as we speak, but I have pictures from everyone’s cameras and it’s about 500 pics so I’ll try to get them all on there today and if you’re looking at them and thinking I just saw pictures like that its cause there are different camera on there.

So there is my last month. I’ve forgotten a few things I know, but when I remember them I’ll post em!

Word up

P.s. [CHECK IT OUT!!! It’s a rough draft, but RappinElves.com is up and running. You can see we still have some kinks to work out, but it’s getting there!!]