So today was the day, my actual birthday! Ray and I didn't get home until about 1:30 am from bowling and then I was up early so that I could visit with my parents. When I got out of bed, I was greeted by an amazing site: my mother had cleaned our entire kitchen! Ray had spent most of yesterday baking me a birthday cake, and was late for our dinner reservation, so he didn't have time to clean up before he left. It was amazing! Eventually we decided that a quiet breakfast at home was the way to do, and Ray and Mom headed off to the grocery store for supplies. They came back with the makings of steak and eggs, french toast (from a french baguette) and tatter tots (at birthday girl request)! Breakfast was fantastic, and topped off by some "left over" birthday cake and ice cream!
Around 2:00, my parents had to hit the road. They wanted to get home before it got dark and I still had homework to finish.
Aren't they great? It's a three hour drive each way, and they were up for less than a day, but they did it for my birthday!
Before they left they did me the favor of re-staging their initial surprise arrivial so that I could take a picture for the blog. Well, my mom is yelling surprise, I don't think my Dad knew what was going on. :o)
Later that evening, with homework successfully accomplished, Ray was nice enough to let me have a small gathering of some girl friends over for pizza and chick flicks. We ordered pizza and garlic bread with cheese from Marco's (my favorite) and Jami brought a whole bag full of chick flicks for us to select from. Our first film was 13 Going On 30 during which Jami and Danielle both realized their mutual love for Jennifer Garner and Alias. It was sort of like a big-girl sleep over. You know, the kind where it's a work night, and you can't stay up too late.
For our second film I gave the girls a choice between Top Gun (got Tonya's vote) or Footloose (which Jami voted for). Danielle was the tie breaker, and I quote, because she wanted to take the "highway to the Danger Zone"! So Top Gun it was!
Ray was a good sport and even hung around with us through all the girlie-ness. He mostly worked on his homework for his Drawing for Games class.
The ladies were very sweet, and showered me with gifts (which they had been told not to do). Jami and Tonya gave me a gift card to the Palace 9 movie theatre (yippie! girls' night!) and Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire as part of my need to collect all of the Harry Potter books in hardcover. I've read the entire series twice, but all having borrowed the books from other people. I love it so much, I know I'll want to read them again, so before my birthday last year I was meantioning how I wanted to start collecting them. Well, Jami and Tonya gave me the first two for my birthday last year, and the third one for Christmas!
Danielle and Kat and Andrew (in absentia) gave me a gift card to Barnes and Noble, which I am extremely psyched about! I got hooked on a series of books (Outlander by Diana Gabaldon) as I purchased the first one on a recommendation before the trip to South Africa (they are big books, and I had two 16 hour plane rides). Now I'm totally hooked. The books are big and they take me a while to get through (I don't have all that much time to read), but Ray was nice enough to let me get the third one for my birthday, and now I can certainly purchase the rest of the published series (she's still writing them) with my gift card!
One other amazing gift I received was from Sarah and Jay (they gave it to me at the bowling party last night). Sarah is AMAZINGLY crafty and she made this totally adorable magnets for me!
Actually, the photo doesn't do them justice. Sarah has her own crafty blog site and posted a much better photo of them (and the awesome card she made too) on her site!
All in all it was an outstanding birthday! I was able to spend time with my family and friends and felt so loved by everyone! Thank you everybody for making this old lady's birthday awesome! :o)