Thursday, April 7, 2011

My Birthday

I had a birthday last month. I'm now 32. Let's just leave it at that. I had a few celebrations, as I'm realizing, is customary in our family. My mom, sister, and I had a fun relaxing girl's only weekend the week before my birthday. Then on my actual day, a good friend hosted a little potluck lunch/play date in my honor. It was so fun. It combined two of my favorite things: tasting lots of different foods (that I didn't have to prepare), and chit chatting with the gals. Birthday perfection!

My family birthday dinner had to be postponed a week because a wicked evil stomach flu hit our family hard. Everyone except Eli got sick. I'm not sure how he managed to escape. It started with Seth, then gradually infested a new family member (or 2) daily. It was awful. I thought I was going to die. I love having a big family, but this was one of those times when a big family is not a perk. We were house bound for an entire week and Ben did more pukie laundry that I care to remember. I thought that in the middle of our little crisis, I was just having bad morning sickness, and was overcome with the thought that I had to live another month feeling so awful, but then a few days later, I was remarkably better, and realized I must have had the flu too. A lot of friends helped me out, delivering gatorade and chicken noodle soup, dinner and kind thoughts. I learned a good lesson through it all. Sometimes you just have to ask for help. People want to help, but they have to know you need it. I'm not so good at the asking part. I'm going to work on that.

So the cakes don't look fancy, but I tell you, I think that was the best chocolate cake I've ever had. I think my mom's holding out on some kind of boxed cake secret recipe. This was the first day we ventured out of the house after the yucky bug. I was so happy to get out of the house, and to eat real food (that I didn't have to cook).

Papaw and his girls enjoying dessert.

This was Friday after our hellaceous week. A sweet friend sent a "get well" fruit basket. We devoured it. I think it was the first solid food most of us had eaten all week. Look how pale everyone looks!

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