35th Birthday Dinner

Yes, I can't deny it: I'm no longer a girl, but a woman. At 35, I can not deny that "woman" is how I will be described until it finally changes to "weird old lady", but that shouldn't be for another 20 to 30 years.

I was happy to sleep in on my birthday. I woke up and went to Jamba Juice for my favorite blueberry and blackberry steel cut oatmeal. After breakfast I walked to Hermosa Beach and got my exercise walking on the strand and every half mile or so I did 10 lunges on each leg. I felt good, but when I was showering I realized I would be spending the rest of my birthday alone doing errands! I called my sister Erika, who is visiting California this month, so that I could hang out with her (while doing the laundry that I had to do!) and her family. It was nice because I was able open the gift from Erika's kids with them to witness it.

The kids got me a beautiful heart shaped necklace:
While I was there, I brought a gift that my friend, Elan (the one who just got married) had given me the night before her wedding. I was really amazed that she got me a gift while she was planning her wedding! I was even more amazed when I opened it up: Elan had put together an album of our November 2001 trip to Paris! She had saved the email I had sent out after our trip describing each day and pasted each day's description on the left side of an album page and the right side had ticket stubs, pictures and museum pamphlets in them relating to the day I was describing! The time it must have taken her to do this! In addition to that, Elan was the first person to text me on my birthday. She is such a sweet person and a great friend.

Reading the album really took me back in time!

I planned a dinner with friends at Cheesecake Factory at 6pm. I was very happy to have Erika be able to come, even though she spent the whole time telling embarrassing stories about me to my friends. That's why I love her, I guess! Haha.

All of my close friends came to my birthday dinner and we all had a great time!

Above from left to right: Nicole, Jenn, Robyn and me
Angie and Chris got the most "benefit" from Erika's stories! Below: Lisa and Nicole

Here is everyone except Lisa (she's behind the camera):
From left to right: Me, Marshall, Erika, Nicole, Jenn, Bryan, Angie, Chris, Tania, Deanne and Colleen.

Thanks everyone for a great birthday dinner!