Chiro and Lery said they’d make the pinchos for the relief sale again, but this year they’d be bringing reinforcements.

First it was just one of their sons and their daughter’s boyfriend (their daughter and niece are living here in town this year). Then Lery’s brother Joyto and his wife Heidi said they were coming with their three kids. Then Tony and Carmen (the couple that took our place and are living in our house) and their two boys. Then Chiro’s brother Rolando and his wife Glorimar and their daughter, but Shhhh, don’t tell anyone (they wanted to surprise their daughter who lives here). Then another Puerto Rican family who’d moved to Maryland a couple months back…

Thus their ongoing joke that Puerto Ricans are una plaga (a plague).

We cleaned house and borrowed an air mattress. I cooked butter chicken and taco meat and a big pot of beans and pans of regular granola and French chocolate granola and loaves of bread. My parents said they’d host one of the families. Rolando’s family stayed with other friends. Chiro and Lery’s crew stayed with their daughter. Heidi and Joyto with us.

Everyone arrived mid-week, and Thursday we swung into high gear: them (plus a bunch of local volunteers) cutting, skewering, and marinating 250 pounds of chicken and us on the doughnuts.

Evenings we ate together — one night I made a taco salad to feed the masses and another night Chiro made a Puerto Rican feast. We stayed up too late, making music and talking and playing games, and one night we went over to Mom and Dad’s for smores around the fire.

The day of the sale, a bunch of them popped in to help with the doughnuts (and thank goodness, too, since we were wildly understaffed)…

… before running off to make hundreds of pinchos.

Once again, their stand was a raging success!

Sunday, the day after the sale, everyone who was still here (a couple families had left), plus my parents, came over for lunch. I’d spent the morning making pizza rolls and, at the last minute, a surprise cake for Heidi’s birthday (the next day).

And then the goodbyes (though Chiro and Lery’s family is still here).

What a treat, to have all of them here, with us.

What a gift.

This same time, years previous: the quotidian (10.8.18), in my kitchen, o happy!, salted caramel ice cream, contradictions and cream, the quotidian (10.8.12), green tomato curry.

This same time, years previous: the myth of the hungry teen, the skirt, ciabatta, dumping: a list, butterscotch cookies, peposo: beef with black pepper and red wine.

For my birthday, my requests were as follows:

to not cook
to not teach anyone
to not make chore lists
to not get presents

If they wanted to make me a cake, a cheesecake would be nice, but I really didn’t care what kind of cake it was as long as I wasn’t in charge. I wanted to write for a long time. Also, I wanted to go on a family hike (but not on the actual day since everyone was at school/working and probably not until after the relief sale — so only in theory, I guess; we’ll see if it actually happens) and play Ultimate Frisbee with the kids.

the ultimate 
For the last few weeks, all four of my kids have been playing Ultimate twice a week at the local university. It’s for anyone — just a bunch of pick-up games — and intergenerational.

You should come, Mom, they kept saying, but since it’d been a good twenty years since I’d last played, and I wasn’t even sure I remembered how to catch a frisbee, much less throw one, and because I was afraid I’d sprain an ankle or something, I kept declining.

But then at our church retreat last weekend, I got roped into playing and it turned out to be loads of fun (never mind that I about died from all the running and jumping), so when I realized that the community group would be playing on my birthday, I decided that that’s what I wanted to do to celebrate: play Ultimate with my kids.

(And then my dad showed up, too, so we were three generations, yay us!)

the day
I spent the day writing, and running errands and blogging and basically not thinking about anyone but myself. When I arrived home mid-afternoon, the kids were over at my mom’s, and the house, I noticed, was spotless.

Hm, they must’ve cleaned, I thought. Nice.

Later that night after the kids had all gone up to bed, I found this:

and my jaw dropped, bless their little hearts. (Also, apparently I’m not the only one who knows how to make a list.)

the supper
Cheese, crackers, pickles, fruit, meats, and two boxes of Captain Crunch.

I couldn’t have been happier.

then, the cake 
I knew it wasn’t going to be a cheesecake, since my favorite cheesecake has to be made 24 hours in advance and no one appeared to be preparing anything ahead of time (as they are wont to do). But I didn’t much care; just not having to think about anything was gift enough.

But! Supper over, they made me cover my eyes and presented me with a wee baby chocolate cake, which didn’t fool me for a second — no one goes to the trouble of mixing up only a wee bit of cake batter. And sure enough, then the real cake appeared.

Three layers, and each layer brazenly and extravagantly studded, sprinkled, piled, and armoured in candy, with a jauntly red ribbon wrapped round the bottom layer. I couldn’t get over it. It was utterly spectacular.

They eagerly filled me in on the details: how my younger daughter had made the cakes and my older daughter had bought an obscene amount of candy. How they’d taken everything to my parents’ house (my parents weren’t at home) and set up their cake shop there. How they’d printed off plans from the internet and measured and calculated and chopped and iced and decorated, all working together.

That, plus the candy, made it pretty much the sweetest cake ever.

This same time, years previous: hey-hey! look who’s here!, the soiree of 2016, welcome home to the circus, getting shod, the quotidian (9.29.14), pointless and chatty, chocolate birthday cake with vanilla water frosting, a jiggle on the wild side.