My 30th Birthday, Mother's Day, & Our 10th Wedding Anniversary

That's right...I turned the big 3-0 this year. I have to say that I was pretty well ok with it. Daniel remembers being totally depressed on his 30th wondering why he spent most of his 20's a slave to medicine. Whereas with me, I finally feel like my age is catching up to my life experience! It's a bit strange to not be twenty-something anymore, but I've felt much older than that for a long time anyway. I had been really sick with a bad viral cold of some sort the week before my birthday, so I wasn't in the "party" mode like I would have been. Daniel did not disappoint me in the least, though. He arranged to have a surprise party for me with all of my friends and their families at a local pizza place. It was fabulous! Tristan actually had track county qualifiers that day, and I felt a little guilty leaving to meet Daniel, but Tristan said, "It's ok mom, it's your birthday, you deserve to have a good time." What a nice kid, huh?? I had thought I was meeting Daniel with Addi and Alicia (Avery was with a babysitter...actually 3 babysitters...Kathy's girls were watching her) for dinner, but then we walked into my big birthday bash!!! Daniel had thought that I had found out the surprise, so he had told everyone that he thought I knew, so no one even yelled, "SURPRISE!!" After I assured everyone I had NO idea, then they yelled a belated, "surprise" for me. It was so fun to just be able to sit and visit with friends. I was glad Kathy had volunteered her girls to watch Avery for me. It was really fun, and my friends all gave me quite fabulous gifts. I love my friends. I know I say how fabulous they are often, but it is really true. I am so grateful we moved here.

Kathy and I with a small glimpse of the food. Daniel ordered A LOT of food, and it was sooo yummy!!

Blowing out my pretend candles...he was bound to forget something! But I'm just fine with him forgetting candles when he totally blew my 30th birthday out of the water!!!!

After we got home, and transferred Avery into her bed, Daniel had me open my gifts from the family. I got a "Vornado" fan for Sunday mornings when it is my turn to sleep in. I can flip on the Vornado and not hear a thing so I can sleep until my heart's content. It's fantastic. I love it. I also got a beautiful heart pendant with matching earrings. My favorite thing in the world is almond toffee, so I also got a big container of chocolate covered almond toffee from Costco. It was a lovely day. I only wish I had made myself look better that day....but I hadn't been feeling well, and I thought I was spending the evening at a track meet.

at home with my gifts

the pendant and earrings the kids picked out

Mother's Day was next. I had a wonderful day. The kids all made me cards, and Daniel made me breakfast after I got to sleep in (thanks to the gentle roar of the Vornado). The kids took care of each other all morning before church. Tristan helped Addi get her lunch so I didn't even have to do that! My gift was a new deep fryer (a must have in any southern kitchen). The temperature gauge on my old one broke, and it was just getting sticky and yucky from all the old oil. My NEW one can cook twice the amount of food, and all of the pieces come apart so I can submerge them into soapy water so I don't have the yucky sticky coating on the outside of my fryer. It's a thing of beauty. So for dinner, we had fried chicken. It was DE-licious!

May not look like much, but it is truly magnificent.

And then it was our 10th wedding anniversary. I can not believe we have been married 10 years! I haven't been wearing my wedding ring for a few years now. My fingers were too fat when I was pregnant with Avery, so I started buying really large and obnoxious fake ones. When my finger was finally small enough to fit my ring, I noticed that a few of my prongs were broken, and my center diamond was spinning in the setting. Too afraid to lose my diamond, I stopped wearing it, and again returned to the fake kind. After a while I really started to miss my ring. I had told Daniel that I would love to have a band since I never got one when we got married (I wanted to be able to add to it later on down the road and didn't find it necessary at the time). The one he wanted to get for me was much more expensive than he anticipated and settled for just fixing my ring for now. On the morning of our anniversary, I half awoke (I never fully wake up that early) to Daniel putting my fixed ring on my finger! I didn't know he had taken it to get fixed, so it was a wonderful surprise. We were both a little over-partied with my birthday, mother's day, Tristan's birthday, and a large purchase of his motorcycle, so neither of us had really planned anything for our anniversary. After I got my ring back, I totally got into the anniversary mood! I called in a babysitter, and Daniel and I went on a date just like we would have back in the good 'ole days! We hopped on the new motorcycle and went to dinner and dessert. It was a nice evening spent together reflecting on how far we've come and all that we have accomplished in just 10 years.... And just think...we still have the "rest of forever" to go!