My 37th birthday

I was born on Wednesday, September 5, 1979.  It was two days after Labor Day that year.  Since my birthday this year fell on Labor Day I was curious to find out how many times my birthday has fallen on the actual holiday.  I'm going to put it here so that when I forget I can just reference this post in the future: 1983 when I turned 4, 1988 when I turned 9, 1994 when I turned 15, 2005 when I turned 26, 2011 when I turned 32 and 2016 when I turned 37.  The next Labor Day birthday will be 2022 when I turn 43.    

It's always nice to have a holiday as part of a three day weekend for one's birthday.

The day started with Michael waking me up as he snuck out of bed to go get donuts.  I never went back to sleep.  But it's OK because I got to lie in bed and do nothing, which is almost as good as sleeping. 

I told him I wanted to make no decisions about the donut place or the selection.  Sometimes I just can't make one more choice.  He did well. 

I also had my first of two pumpkin spice lattes of the year.  I'll do one more probably in November.

Then it was time for presents!

Elliott said we needed a silly face picture. 

Spencer was watching when I loaded these pictures and he thought it would be funny to do a thought bubble by his head.  I blew his mind when I told him I could. He picked the thought and was delighted with himself. 

Gift card to a steak house from Jerry and Lois.

A White House gingerbread house from Jerry and Lois.  We're going to have it ready for election day.

Candle that I was not expecting from Michael and the kids.

Haunted house wallflower from Bath and Body Works that I specifically asked for. 

Halloween hand soaps that I specifically asked for and by "specifically" I mean I showed Michael pictures of the ones he was not to buy me. 

Pictures of a a neck stretch book and the Pete's Dragon soundtrack CD that I ordered for myself and didn't get delivered in time. 

A Christmas pig picture that I mentioned to Spencer I wanted and he was kind enough to remember and mention to Michael. 

A dress from Old Navy that I asked for and drew a map of the store and the rack of dresses for Michael so he had no difficulty finding the correct one. 

After presents I changed into my new dress and we took some more pictures with my pig gifts. 

And then we headed to the movies.  I wanted to go to a dine-in theater and we wanted to see Kubo and the Two strings.  The only place we could do both was in very north Scottsdale.  We all ate lunch there.  I had red wine.  Michael had a stroke when he got the bill.

BTW, I think the flash illuminated my face but not the kids' faces, because this is what I really looked like.  I didn't do anything with the lighting. 

Family picture back at home in between the movie and dinner.

Nobody was actually very hungry for dinner so I decided to go to Kneaders so we could just have a light meal.  I also didn't want to spend a lot of money after the billion dollar movie lunch.  It ended up being a perfect choice.  There was no wait, our food was delivered within minutes and we all enjoyed it.  I had french onion soup and half a grilled cheese sandwich and it was the perfect birthday dinner. 

Elliott really, really, really wanted to take our picture.  We let him, but we were so nervous about him dropping the camera we didn't notice anything behind us.  Do you see?

Our family tradition for the last four years has been to have dinner and dessert or just dessert at The Cheesecake Factory on my birthday.  We were all pretty tired though and nobody was starving for a heavy slice of cheesecake and Kneaders has a big and delightful dessert case, so after dinner we got some treats to go and headed home.  Extra bonus: We got four wonderful desserts for $7.  One slice of cheesecake would have been more than that at The Cheesecake Factory.  

I got a chocolate mousse bomb. 

And that was the end of my special day.  Which is good, because Spencer's birthday was the next day and I needed to rest and recover to prepare for his day.