Whenever I have thought about turning 30 I’ve always kinda silently freaked out. 30. I mean it’s HUGE, right?!?! And as a kid I would cry about turing 10. I’ve just always hated getting older. And here I am the big 3-0. Yikes!
Thankfully I am pretty dang content with being 30 🙂 I knew not to have mega huge expectations for my birthday…I mean we have a pretty new baby who I breastfeed and who doesn’t take a bottle too great. So it’s pretty hard to plan much for me these days!
Near the end of October Zach was out of town for almost a solid week. I was worn out and exhausted and honestly did not feel like going out for dinner with Casey and Robyn. They had planned the dinner several weeks prior and when they planned it I instantly assumed it was something birthday-related. I mean everyone knows I do the planning haha but I rolled with it and they ended up doing a stellar job throwing me off track. When the day came of our dinner I just threw on a random outfit (dress is from Goodwill haha!) and debated canceling like 5 times that day as I just was not feeling like going out. I truly no longer thought it was a birthday surprise!
Casey picked me up and we had to run an errand on the way and we were meeting Robyn at Texas Roadhouse for dinner. We pulled in the parking lot and I was blindfolded immediately 😉
I was then driven to an undisclosed location
I have awesome friends…they are willing to hide in a mega gross bathroom in order to surprise me 😉
Dinner was at my favorite place (Aligatu…Japanese Steakhouse) and with many of my absolute favorite people!!! I was truly surprised and we had SUCH a great time. It meant the WORLD to me that they planned an evening for me and it was very, very thoughtful. The group all gelled super well that night and we all laughed a ton (especially thanks to Kayla and her crazy stories!). I had a GREAT start to my birthday!!!
Top row from the left: Keeli, Courtney, Katie, Lindsay, Julie, Kori
Front row from the left: Casey, ME, Robyn and Kayla!
Ever wondered who the woman is behind our amazing family photos? It’s Lindsay!
Stole this from Keeli’s instagram haha
My BFF 🙂
Our chef was HILARIOUS and they even brought out a cookie cake for me!
Everyone gave me a card filled with sweet words…I’m so beyond blessed in the friendship department!
I’m super mega thankful for the timing of the friends night. It was prior to my intense breakdown and realization of my PPD. My real birthday? Not such great timing. It was the same week that I ended up realizing I was struggling with PPD and needed to get help. I feel bad that I wasn’t my truest self that day and couldn’t fully enjoy it, but I’m thankful that Zach had something planned several weeks later that was MUCH better timed 😉
My real birthday (Nov 1st!) was on a Saturday this year so I was able to spend the entire day with my sweet family! It started off with a list of choices for breakfast…one guess what I chose 😉
Pancakes!!!
While Tess napped the big kids and I had a tea party 🙂
And after nap we did presents!
I got a shower bluetooth speaker and then my next gift was really the only other REAL gift (all those wrapped boxes? empty! haha) and it was a trip to DISNEY!!!
For the past several years I have been dropping not so subtle hints that the best place to turn 30 would be at Disney. I’m glad Zach listened haha! I had been hoping he’d planned a Disney trip but I didn’t have a lot of expectations surrounding it AND I was such a hot mess in the days leading up to my birthday that I was SO worried that he was taking me on my legit birthday. It really worked out perfect as he planned the trip for just him and I and booked a stay on property for the first week in Dec (so y’all know a LOT more is coming up about that!). He put a lot of thought and effort into making it special and it was AWESOME 🙂
For lunch we had Chicken Salad Chick, of course!
During naps I went shopping solo at a nearby outlet 🙂
And came home to a sweet surprise from Casey! Flowers!
And a little gift and card from Mrs. Charlotte too 🙂
In honor of my birthday my husband, who has 94 Instagram posts, finally posted a picture of ME for the first time. I told him that I’m not going to be excited about something that should have been done ages ago?!?! I mean his Dad’s pics are on his Instagram more than his wife’s 😉
With all the Tess bottle issues in full force…I told Zach I didn’t want to attempt to go out to dinner. It just wasn’t worth it. So we stayed in but still got dressed cute and took some pics! Then we had a picnic dinner from Red Lobster 🙂
Sweet birthday art 🙂
And ice cream cake, from Dairy Queen OF COURSE (best ice cream cake!)
The big kids and I played Candyland and Britt won 🙂
It wasn’t the best birthday celebration day of my life or anything but the Disney trip MORE than made up for it 😉 I just decided to pretend like I was 29 until we got to Disney haha!
Katie came over to have a birthday celebration night with just us and it was great (no pics though!) she was so thoughtful and got me a Disney gift card to use on our trip! After Tess and Britt were in bed we all went upstairs with Kye and played Mario Karts and it totally brought back great memories from back in the day when Katie, Zach, Ashley and myself would all play Mario Karts all the time at our old house 🙂
That next weekend I was supposed to have everyone over to celebrate my bday with the family. We planned to do a bonfire night like we did last year. When I got back from my dr appointment to discuss my PPD the first thing I did was cancel that party. Which is so not like me! But I knew that Tess not being able to take a bottle would cause me to freak out and I didn’t want to be missing my own party to be nursing her! I also knew that it would hurt Mrs. Charlotte’s feelings if I didn’t fully enjoy my bday celebration! So instead just us girls went to dinner one night. Low-key and much better for my anxiety levels at that point 🙂 It was great! And happened to be about a month after my friend party…I sure do know how to stretch out a birthday huh?
I’m so appreciative of everyone who took the time to wish me a Happy Birthday! I am thankful for the blessings of my life these past 30 years and truly believe the best is yet to come!
