Silobration at Sixty Surprise 2019
In June 2019, I realized that my mom's 60th birthday was in October. Yup, I know, "daughter of the year award" right here. But really, no one can truly fault me cause I wasn't the only one that it didn't dawn on until we were a few months away. I quickly tried to think of the options; do we go somewhere as the 4 of us? Do we invite all the family to us? Do we invite everyone to meet in Florida where most of her family lives a majority of the year? What do we do? Really, the pressure was on because we did exactly what she wanted for her 50th; New York City, staying in Times Square, Lion King tickets, Serendipity, and some shopping.
I sent out a message to her 5 siblings and their spouses to say that there was a birthday coming and that we were going to come up with something, but wanted the most of them to be available to attend. After about a month of discussing with my immediate family, we determined that it would probably be easiest to surprise her, if that was what we wanted to do, if we kept it local for us. I added cousins and close friends to the list of people on the tentative invite, and said that we were looking at a series of weekends from end of September to beginning of October.
A few family/friends suggested a couple dates that they would be able to attend, which further narrowed it down. One of the weekends that was on the short list was my mom's birthday weekend, which also, coincided with the Silobration at Magnolia Market.
We gave it some thought, and decided that we just needed to pull the trigger and schedule for that weekend, and when we did, I got a text from one of my cousins that they were going to make the trip, but had one request; to go the the Silobration. We presented the idea to my mom to see if she wanted to go, since we had gone to Spring at the Silos, that maybe she would want to do that for her birthday. Of course, her answer to further complicate the situation was no. She said she didn't want to deal with the crowds and just didn't want to do that this year.
Behind-the-scenes, there was a lot of back and forth on ideas as to how we should handle the weekend. Do we go to Waco and stay in Waco with family? Do we just let the family go to Waco and then surprise my mom on Saturday? Do we just tell her that she doesn't have a say on Waco? We were getting closer and closer to the festivities that decisions needed to be made.
Melanie and I were in talks about the party part of the weekend, and I decided to go all in with the theme of Magnolia and then enlisted the help of Melanie with the food prep part and my sounding board. We solidified the theme, the food & the prep for the party. She sent me an image the week before the party of the changing wall entrance for the Silobration, and I had been pretty set with the theme & what I had to decorate, but I did feel like I was missing something that brought it all together. Even when Melanie wasn't trying to help, she was (really that is the story of our lives, though). I stopped on my way home, bought canvases and took a couple days to complete the painted version of the concrete wall that we would see at the silos, and kept it a secret until the Thursday before the party.
Two-three weeks from family coming into town for the surprise, we knew we had to give my mom the heads up that there would be a party & that we would be going to Waco. My dad sat my mom down and said "you are not allowed to ask questions, you are not allowed to guess, you are not allowed to work yourself up over this, but there is someONE coming into town to celebrate your birthday with us and their one stipulation was that we would be going to Waco on Friday." Of course, my mom had so many questions, and literally up to the night before she was concerned about what this person would need for breakfast.
Little did she know, that even though we had given everyone the option & have the space to stay with us, they all decided to stay at a hotel close by that gave options for food & shopping in walking distance just in case. Everything was taken care of except for it all to remain a secret & how we were going to present the big surprise.
We were going to have 3 of my mom's siblings, their spouses, my mom's parents and one of my cousins & her husband all flying in on Friday morning! They had rented 2 vehicles and we had everything pretty well planned. Everyone had kept the secret... Until about 6:35 pm on Tuesday. There is a group text with my mom & her siblings that alluded to something happening & her parents coming to visit. I got a text that let me know, and when I saw my mom I told her she still wasn't allowed to read into the text that was received. My mom know knew that it was going to be her parents & someone else. We continued to plan as if nothing had changed.
Friday morning, bright & early, woke up and started prepping for the morning festivities of arrivals! I had some texts that flights were on time, so then it was just a matter of them arriving and how we would surprise. There were 3 flights & 2 vehicles with about an hour difference in timing. We decided that since my mom's parents were arriving first with one sibling & sister-in-law, let's have that be one surprise, and she will think that is it since she was aware of one person + parents now. We told my mom that the flight was delayed and we would get a text when they landed to go pick them up; so when the doorbell rang, she looked at us with a "why is that happening" look. We had her get the door, and she just kept saying that she couldn't believe it.
Well, believe it, cause when the doorbell rang about an hour later, with 2 more siblings & their spouses and my cousin & her husband, my mom couldn't believe it. As my cousin, Nicole, said that my mom makes it to everyone's everything else, and this was an opportunity to be there for something for her. Everything else, was downhill, or so I thought, from this moment. We then set out on the road to Waco.
I have been to Waco for an event before at Magnolia, but traffic was so bad just getting to Waco, that it led me into the city differently & then it was figuring out where to park; well, we didn't park in the correct spot. I parked on the backside of Magnolia, but for this event, they make you walk to a specific front entrance, so for anyone looking at going to any in the future, park on the southern side of Magnolia. Because I took what the app Waze told me to, somehow I beat everyone else to Waco, so the pups, my brother and I waited for the others to arrive. We were the welcoming comity for a little while & when all the rest of the family met up with us, we walked through the market after waiting in the line. One thing I have to give them credit for, after having been to the venue a few times at different times of the year, is that they have set up the market with direction & it allows people to walk through and find things without feeling too pushed & forced through. Made it through the market, picked up a couple special things & made our way to the green space. We had a couple of opportunities to get group photos & took advantage of it, which is something, as a family we struggle with, but people were so willing to offer to take photos to help our group out!
We walked around and looked at the food truck options, and decided to stand in a couple lines. While waiting, Nicole all but ran out of line, and I noticed that where she went there was a large crowd; Joanna Gaines made an appearance! Nicole was the person that really wanted to go to Waco, and to allow her to have the moment to be feet away from Joanna was totally worth the trip!
Joanna walked around after a few questions from her team, and started to ask questions from people who just randomly were there sitting at picnic tables & also still being interviewed at the same time. It was fun watching her say hello to children who were about her kids ages & also thinking about someone who has built this empire getting to see what she does for the every day person was kind of amazing to me. Joanna Gaines had a bigger picture, and a love for a town that wouldn't have been anything but the home of Baylor University, and she has further developed and expanded on her picture to make it something pretty near perfect that so many have already tried to replicate. Being someone that is a creative and feels like I have so much more to offer than what I can currently do, it was a pretty powerful thing to sit and look at what she was able to see in that moment walking around a part of what she has created. Another fun thing was to see how excited my mom was in the moment she got to see Joanna Gaines for the first time in all the trips to Waco we have been able to take over the years, but to be doing the trip with her family that she was surprised by just hours before was even more exciting.
We ended the day going to a Waco favorite of my dads to stop in on when he is there for work, and we introduced some family to chicken fried steak. I believe that we were the most entertaining table the waitress had that day, and then my uncle further made her day by gifting her not only with what she deserved, but with what she never expected, leading her to exclaim that it was the best day ever and she was going to go cry. We then made our way back to DFW, and took the rest of the day to relax and prep for Saturday evenings festivities.
You can read about Saturday's festivities under MoD Party.
I sent out a message to her 5 siblings and their spouses to say that there was a birthday coming and that we were going to come up with something, but wanted the most of them to be available to attend. After about a month of discussing with my immediate family, we determined that it would probably be easiest to surprise her, if that was what we wanted to do, if we kept it local for us. I added cousins and close friends to the list of people on the tentative invite, and said that we were looking at a series of weekends from end of September to beginning of October.
A few family/friends suggested a couple dates that they would be able to attend, which further narrowed it down. One of the weekends that was on the short list was my mom's birthday weekend, which also, coincided with the Silobration at Magnolia Market.
We gave it some thought, and decided that we just needed to pull the trigger and schedule for that weekend, and when we did, I got a text from one of my cousins that they were going to make the trip, but had one request; to go the the Silobration. We presented the idea to my mom to see if she wanted to go, since we had gone to Spring at the Silos, that maybe she would want to do that for her birthday. Of course, her answer to further complicate the situation was no. She said she didn't want to deal with the crowds and just didn't want to do that this year.
Behind-the-scenes, there was a lot of back and forth on ideas as to how we should handle the weekend. Do we go to Waco and stay in Waco with family? Do we just let the family go to Waco and then surprise my mom on Saturday? Do we just tell her that she doesn't have a say on Waco? We were getting closer and closer to the festivities that decisions needed to be made.
Melanie and I were in talks about the party part of the weekend, and I decided to go all in with the theme of Magnolia and then enlisted the help of Melanie with the food prep part and my sounding board. We solidified the theme, the food & the prep for the party. She sent me an image the week before the party of the changing wall entrance for the Silobration, and I had been pretty set with the theme & what I had to decorate, but I did feel like I was missing something that brought it all together. Even when Melanie wasn't trying to help, she was (really that is the story of our lives, though). I stopped on my way home, bought canvases and took a couple days to complete the painted version of the concrete wall that we would see at the silos, and kept it a secret until the Thursday before the party.
Two-three weeks from family coming into town for the surprise, we knew we had to give my mom the heads up that there would be a party & that we would be going to Waco. My dad sat my mom down and said "you are not allowed to ask questions, you are not allowed to guess, you are not allowed to work yourself up over this, but there is someONE coming into town to celebrate your birthday with us and their one stipulation was that we would be going to Waco on Friday." Of course, my mom had so many questions, and literally up to the night before she was concerned about what this person would need for breakfast.
Little did she know, that even though we had given everyone the option & have the space to stay with us, they all decided to stay at a hotel close by that gave options for food & shopping in walking distance just in case. Everything was taken care of except for it all to remain a secret & how we were going to present the big surprise.
We were going to have 3 of my mom's siblings, their spouses, my mom's parents and one of my cousins & her husband all flying in on Friday morning! They had rented 2 vehicles and we had everything pretty well planned. Everyone had kept the secret... Until about 6:35 pm on Tuesday. There is a group text with my mom & her siblings that alluded to something happening & her parents coming to visit. I got a text that let me know, and when I saw my mom I told her she still wasn't allowed to read into the text that was received. My mom know knew that it was going to be her parents & someone else. We continued to plan as if nothing had changed.
Friday morning, bright & early, woke up and started prepping for the morning festivities of arrivals! I had some texts that flights were on time, so then it was just a matter of them arriving and how we would surprise. There were 3 flights & 2 vehicles with about an hour difference in timing. We decided that since my mom's parents were arriving first with one sibling & sister-in-law, let's have that be one surprise, and she will think that is it since she was aware of one person + parents now. We told my mom that the flight was delayed and we would get a text when they landed to go pick them up; so when the doorbell rang, she looked at us with a "why is that happening" look. We had her get the door, and she just kept saying that she couldn't believe it.
Well, believe it, cause when the doorbell rang about an hour later, with 2 more siblings & their spouses and my cousin & her husband, my mom couldn't believe it. As my cousin, Nicole, said that my mom makes it to everyone's everything else, and this was an opportunity to be there for something for her. Everything else, was downhill, or so I thought, from this moment. We then set out on the road to Waco.
I have been to Waco for an event before at Magnolia, but traffic was so bad just getting to Waco, that it led me into the city differently & then it was figuring out where to park; well, we didn't park in the correct spot. I parked on the backside of Magnolia, but for this event, they make you walk to a specific front entrance, so for anyone looking at going to any in the future, park on the southern side of Magnolia. Because I took what the app Waze told me to, somehow I beat everyone else to Waco, so the pups, my brother and I waited for the others to arrive. We were the welcoming comity for a little while & when all the rest of the family met up with us, we walked through the market after waiting in the line. One thing I have to give them credit for, after having been to the venue a few times at different times of the year, is that they have set up the market with direction & it allows people to walk through and find things without feeling too pushed & forced through. Made it through the market, picked up a couple special things & made our way to the green space. We had a couple of opportunities to get group photos & took advantage of it, which is something, as a family we struggle with, but people were so willing to offer to take photos to help our group out!
We walked around and looked at the food truck options, and decided to stand in a couple lines. While waiting, Nicole all but ran out of line, and I noticed that where she went there was a large crowd; Joanna Gaines made an appearance! Nicole was the person that really wanted to go to Waco, and to allow her to have the moment to be feet away from Joanna was totally worth the trip!
Joanna walked around after a few questions from her team, and started to ask questions from people who just randomly were there sitting at picnic tables & also still being interviewed at the same time. It was fun watching her say hello to children who were about her kids ages & also thinking about someone who has built this empire getting to see what she does for the every day person was kind of amazing to me. Joanna Gaines had a bigger picture, and a love for a town that wouldn't have been anything but the home of Baylor University, and she has further developed and expanded on her picture to make it something pretty near perfect that so many have already tried to replicate. Being someone that is a creative and feels like I have so much more to offer than what I can currently do, it was a pretty powerful thing to sit and look at what she was able to see in that moment walking around a part of what she has created. Another fun thing was to see how excited my mom was in the moment she got to see Joanna Gaines for the first time in all the trips to Waco we have been able to take over the years, but to be doing the trip with her family that she was surprised by just hours before was even more exciting.
We ended the day going to a Waco favorite of my dads to stop in on when he is there for work, and we introduced some family to chicken fried steak. I believe that we were the most entertaining table the waitress had that day, and then my uncle further made her day by gifting her not only with what she deserved, but with what she never expected, leading her to exclaim that it was the best day ever and she was going to go cry. We then made our way back to DFW, and took the rest of the day to relax and prep for Saturday evenings festivities.
You can read about Saturday's festivities under MoD Party.