Happy Birthday to Me!

I just had a birthday! I turned 38 and the celebrations went on for over a week. Nice, huh? It started several days before my actual birthday because my dear friend Alysa was going to be out of town, so she wanted to make sure I got my celebration before she left. She made arrangements for a few friend to have lunch at Jackalope Ranch. That place is beautiful!!! But the food and service were pretty disappointing. It is a good thing the company was so great to make up for it. Here I am with my sweet friends Heidi and Alysa...

And here with my cute friend Jenie (There was no one around to take pictures so we had to do it in shifts.) Thank you ladies for a wonderful early birthday lunch!

My birthday itself was good, but also somewhat of a disappointment. It started early, as I had to drive Alex to the pioneer trek at Riley's farm in Oak Glen at the crack of dawn. That was actually very fun. I brought my camera and stayed several hours to take pictures of the kids and visit with some neat people (including that cute lady above) and wait for them to take off on their trek. I wanted SO bad to be joining them, but apparently I was not invited. Hmmm. It was fun, and I took some great pictures, and it was so nice to be outside.

Then, the fun didn't stop there because I stopped at the outlet mall on the way home, specifically to visit my favorite store - Brighton - and I happened upon a HUGE clearance sale where I got myself some sunglasses, a hat, 3 cute belts, and a handful of other little things. They must have known it was my birthday somehow. Happy Birthday to me!

As great as it is to go shopping without kids, it is 100 times better to go shopping with a friend. Oh well.

When I got home, Dennis surprised me by taking my computer in to have the memory doubled which is wonderful because it had been running very slow for some time due to all the pictures. It runs so much smoother now!!! Yay!

So far, so good, right? Well, I was home that afternoon, and the cabinet builder was there putting some built-ins in the dining room, which was very nice until I heard a huge CRASH and the unmistakable sound of shattering glass! He had put in a corner hutch to display my very favorite big pieces of milk glass. He had already installed it, put my milk glass into it, and then he was doing some finishing touches (which included hammering!) and the top shelf came crashing down on the shelves full of milk glass below it! It was a sickening sound. In all, my 3 favorite pieces - large, gorgeous footed compotes; the kind you display promenantly in a corner case - were smashed. Happy birthday to me! I didn't know what to say (he felt so bad, but then again so did I) so I just went to get the trash can instead. It isn't like you can just go replace something like that - they had all been lucky finds at garage sales over the past 10 years. Boo hoo hoo.

Luckily, the Bruners cam over shortly thereafter with some roses in a milk glass vase, so that was a start, right? They were so sweet to think of me!

I also got gifts, phone calls, cards, and about a million birthday messages on Facebook, which was really fun.

For dinner we wanted to do something different, so Dennis, my parents, and I went to the Crab Pot in the LQ cove. It was a beautiful evening so we decided to sit out on the patio. It was a fun place. They just put some butcher paper down on the table, then dump a bucket of seafood and veggies- crab, clams, mussels, scallops, red potatoes, and corn - right on the table. It was fun and pretty tasty. Unfortunately, it didn't take long before the flies descended from out of no where. It got pretty bad, and the people that worked there said it usually never gets this bad. Lucky us. The citronella candles they gave us didn't help a bit, and the flies didn't seem to be bothering anyone else. It was bad! Finally, they moved us inside, which was better.

After dinner we all walked around Old Town. There were no flies.

When we got home, the boys surprised me with a big birthday banner, and the little ones had gifts that they had made for me. Dylan had sculpted me a heart with he and I inside. I LOVE his sculptures!!! Then he painted a gift box black and glued white buttons on it so I could use it in my craft room. Very clever! Caleb gathered up some special gifts for me, and a made a cute card. He is such a good card maker - just like his Mom. Luke took a wood lid from a box I had, and filled with with shreds of paper. Under the paper was a little green spider ring - just for me. He was so excited to give it to me, and I wore it the rest of the evening. It must have crawled away, because I don't know where it went.

The other boys were watching TV.

Then, the other bad thing happened on my birthday. That night as I was trying to download all my pictures from the day including the pictures of the Pioneer Trek and the dinner with the flies, my card somehow got erased! No pictures anywhere to be found! I was very upset. That has never happened to me before. Luckily, I had just put in a fresh card that morning, so only the pictures from this one day had disappeared, but it was still a ton of pictures - GONE! Happy Birthday to me!

(The above pictures of the boys was actually re-taken on Sunday - thus the white shirts and ties.)

Overall, though it was a nice birthday.

But it wasn't quite through yet. The celebrations carried over a week when last Friday, Shari and Tara took Roxanne and I out to celebrate both of our birthdays. We had lunch on the patio at a little French place on El Paseo (no flies this time), then we went to get our toes done. What fun we had!!! I love those ladies!

So from looking at pictures of both of my birthday lunches I must ask, do I have some gorgeous friends or what? Thank you all ladies for taking the time to help me celebrate!

Oh, one more thing. Yesterday, as part of my birthday present, my darling husband got up at the crack of dawn to go get in line at the AT&T store to get me my new iPhone that I have been pining for since Luke threw my last one in the spa 2 MONTHS ago. I had decided rather than run out and by a new one, to just hang in there until the new iPhone 4 came out. There were some delays , but it finally came out yesterday, and my hero husband got one for me!!! I LOVE it! It feels so good to be connected again! Thank you, Honey! You rock!

So that was my week-long birthday celebration. It was a great one, despite the broken glass, erased SD card, and all the flies. It was great friends, great family, and a great hubby that made up for all of that! Thank you everyone! Happy Birthday to me!