10 posts tagged “birthday”
Hope everyone had a happy New Year! We went to Betsy & Richards for their 3rd annual party and had a great time, as always. Looking forward to good things in 2009, although I have had bad luck with the odd-numbered years in the past. Both 2005 and 2007 left a lot to be desired, while 2004, 2006, and 2008 were all great years for us. I plan on breaking that pattern this year.
I was pleased when Richard got the fire pit going and they passed out pieces of paper for people to write down the things they wanted to leave behind in 2008 and throw into the fire, and I really couldn't think of anything non-political to write. Last year was a completely different story. I had fun tossing a "Screw You AAA!" message into the fire. But this year, Tadd and I have both had decent jobs and things have been good.
Plans coming up...Our office is closed tomorrow, so I am enjoying a four day weekend. Tadd has to work tomorrow, so after vacuuming up the living room in the aftermath of removing the Christmas decorations, and writing out Christmas thank you cards, I may go to the movies by myself. Not sure yet. Saturday night, my cousin Brianna is spending the night at our place, and then Sunday, Tadd and I are taking her to Epcot. It's our one last hurrah before she goes back to Massachusetts and we go back to work post-holidays. I believe Sunday is also the last day that Disney has their holiday celebrations going on, so we'll get to see Illuminations with the extra Holiday fireworks! I'm excited for Brianna to see that, because they really are spectacular and we haven't gotten a chance to see them so far this year.
Next Friday, we are meeting a bunch of friends at Rising Star at Universal Citywalk for Tadd's 28th birthday. That's the kareoke place where they have a live band and backup singers. SOOOO much fun! Even though I refuse to actually participate...I just like to watch everyone else make fools out of themselves! It will be even more fun when it is Tadd and all of our friends doing the singing.
I'm one day late, but happy birthday to my dad! He turned 52 yesterday. Hopefully now he'll give my mother a break. He always teases her that he married an older woman. She was born in late December of 1955 and he was born in early February of 1956. So they are barely over 1 month apart in age. But every year, during that 1 month, he rags on her constantly. It's all in loving jest, of course, but give Mom a break already! Besides, in the world of modern women, 52 is the new 42, right?
We'll be celebrating his birthday on Sunday when the whole family gets together for the Super Bowl. It will be very fun to watch a Patriots Super Bowl with my grandmother. I'd better bring earplugs, because she can really SCREAM when it comes to football. It cracks me up just how into it she can get! We thought we'd invite some friends over to my parents house as well, but it looks like everyone has other plans. That's fine though. We considered going to Betsy and Richards' Super Bowl party, but it's just too far of a drive and too late of a night for us on a work night. Besides, I really wanted to spend Super Bowl with my family, since this is the Patriots we are talking about...
Well, as of yesterday, Tadd and I are officially back on track, financially. Tadd got his first paycheck yesterday and I got my second paycheck Thursday. I reinstated our automatic savings plan this morning, and paid a TON of bills, so we are 110% back in business. It feels sooooooooooo good! And we are enjoying having nights and weekends together again. I really hope this works out in the long term. The only thing I could really do without is my commute, but I really can't do much about that unless we move. And I really don't want to move unless it's into a house. So I'll just deal for now.
I watched the democratic debate Thursday night and I was so impressed that Tadd sat and watched it with me. He's not a very political guy, for the most part, but he watched the whole thing intently and we were both surprised how much he liked Hillary. I'm an Obama girl myself, but I will happily vote for Hillary if she gets the nomination. They were both so inspiring during the debate...so excited and ready for change. He made a comment of how nice it is to have two democratic front-runners who are both people he would be happy to vote for. I must say I agree.
My weekend was nice, but busy. Saturday, I shopped for the party with my mom and then came home and cleaned. Tadd got home early and helped with the finishing touches. We had seven guests almost immediately, which was strange because we're used to most people being fashionably late. Almost everyone arrived on time. We had a lot of last-minute cancellations, but ended up with a total of 14 people. By the end of the night, we had a fridge FULL of beer. Seriously, I think we had around 50 bottles left over.
Rick and Ryan stayed much later than everyone else, trying out that videogame I got Tadd (Dead Rising). It seemed to be quite a hit. I find it pretty disgusting. It's all about killing zombies in a shopping mall and pretty much ANYTHING in the mall can be used as a weapon. Very bloody, very gross, but actually kind of funny.
Sunday, we celebrated a second time at my parents' house. It was also my grandmother's 75th birthday, so we were celebrating both. My dad grilled steak tips, hot dogs, and chicken and my mom made a chocolate cake from scratch with her brand new Kitchen-Aid mixer. We pretty much just watched football and sat around and ate. My parents gave Tadd some very comfortable black corduroy slippers as a gift. He LOVES them and has been wearing them almost constantly since the moment he opened them (well, whenever he's not out and about). He's wearing them right this minute, as a matter of fact.
Back to work today, and things actually weren't that bad. I'm mostly trained at this point, so no more down time. I actually worked nonstop the whole day and was quite busy. And I think it's actually starting to all sink in now, so I'm starting to get more comfortable in my new position. My boss and I had a good conversation about my progress, and he reassured me that mistakes are part of the learning curve, so not to worry if I mess up sometimes. That made me feel a whole lot better. There are so many little things I have to actively remind myself about and I'm always scared I'm forgetting something. And someone had their first day in customer service today, so I officially handed over the title of "new girl" in record time! Yay for that!
Stephanie's 30th birthday bash was a success! It was a small, but fun gathering. We ate, drank, played Wii games, watched the Red Hot & Boom fireworks that went off at Cranes Roost Park across the street, and had a grand old time. Some highlights:
Here's the whole gang, aside from Bet since he hadn't arrived at that time. We were out in front of our apartment complex, waiting for the fireworks display to start. Left to right: Manny, Richard, Betsy, me, Stephanie, Rick, Ryan, and Tadd.
The girls...Betsy, Stephanie, and me!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY KELLY!!!
By the way...how was the movie last night? Tadd and I are going to see it tonight.
Okay, I'm pretty sure that this will be the last of the birthday entries for me, but I just had to share this.
I got to my office this morning and found an envelope propped up against my computer monitor stand with my name scrawled across the front. I opened the envelope and found a Gemini card. On the front is a picture of twins with the Zodiac wheel around them, and the words "Gemini, May 22 - June 21". I open the card and on one side I find two printed paragraphs about various traits of Geminis, but on the other is a handwritten letter. Here's what it said:
Happy Birthday Heather!!
A little history on this card. I bought this card in or at (I guess) at a mystic shop in Fort Worth, Texas. The year was 2003 and the weather was hot and arid. It was early May and I was talking with Jessica and we spoke of your upcoming 22nd birthday which caused me to buy this card. Well I obviously didn't send it on time and I held onto it for next year (2004). Well that year Jessica got a card for us both to sign and in 2005 I forgot I had it and bought you another one and got drunk at Epcot (obscenely drunk). Then I took it to California with me and well I forgot to send it from there too. But now I found it and I left it out so I wouldn't forget. Many zipcodes and area codes and states and timezones late here you go!! Good riddance card! Hello Heather.
Love,
Bet :)
TX, FL, NC, CA, FL
The envelope too.
Ha ha ha! I can't believe he kept the card all through moving from TX to FL, then to boot camp in NC three years later, then to his training in CA, and all the way back to FL! He is so funny. He works in the call center on the first floor of the building where I work, so I assume he snuck up here on his break last night and put the card in my office. I'm oddly touched by this gesture and it really made me smile when I got into work this morning. He is such a good friend to me and Tadd and I'm SO glad our friendship did not end when he and Jessica broke up.
Bet, on the off chance that you're reading this...you rock!
So I turn 26 years old in mere minutes. Woo hoo. I was born at 8:51AM. I'll probably be sitting here in my office at work at that exact moment. I don't really have anything special planned for today. I'm sure the girls at work all brought in something to eat, because that's what we do on birthdays. So we'll all pig out later on cake, chips, fruit trays, and stuff like that. And I turned on my electric candle-warmer for the first time in ages when I got in. I thought the scent of Yankee Candle's Island Mango wafting through my office would be something nice to do for myself on my birthday.
Although I think my birthday would have been ten times more sweet if my Red Sox had beaten the Yankees last night. Boo. At least they are still #1 in all of MLB, and the only ones above .500 in their division, even though other teams are creeping up. It's also comforting that the Yankees, who are #2 in the Eastern Division are still 9.5 games back from getting ahead of the Red Sox.
On Friday, the girls at work and I are ordering from Bathed & Infused again. I have $26 in credit there, plus free shipping, so I think I'm going to get myself and Tadd each a perfume and get a 4oz lotion for my desk. I've been on a berry kick lately, so I think I'm going to get a scent with some blackberry or raspberry in it. Either that or some sort of fruity/floral tropical scent for summer. My mom wears Salvatore Ferragamo's Incanto Dreams and I love it. I'd consider it a fruity/floral tropical scent and B&I has a dupe of it, so I might just get that. Or the Hanae Mori dupe, which has a lot of berry notes. For Tadd, I really like Maduro, which is has all those manly notes in it...wood, tobacco, leather, etc. Sounds gross when you think of it that way, but I've smelled a sample of it and it's actually really good. Here's the scent description:
MADURO: This sultry scent is reminiscent of after dinner rooms reserved for first class on the Titanic. Earthy, rich teak wood, cognac and a faint hint of tobacco hang in the air. Sophisticated and alluring.
See? Doesn't that sound nice? I think he'll love it. Of course, if he'd rather get something else, that's fine too. As long as it doesn't contain patchouli. Patchouli and my nose do not get along, which is sad because Tadd loves it.
Ok, enough babbling about perfume. Time to attempt to get some work done.
So Tadd planned a whole birthday celebration night for me on Saturday. I think we've determined that he just doesn't have the planning gene. On top of that, he just generally has bad luck (he is a Capricorn, and they are prone to bouts of bad luck). But his effort was valiant and I am extremely appreciative of his efforts.
The night consisted of several stages. Stage one, which went off without a hitch, was a romantic dinner at Kona Cafe in Disney's Polynesian Resort. I had a delicious dinner of Pan-Asian noodles with chicken and Tadd had the prime rib with stir-fried broccoli and mashed yukon gold potatoes. I had a glass of riesling with dinner and we shared some banana-caramel creme brulee for dessert. Everything was delicious. The plan from there was to have some time to wander around by ourselves for awhile, then meet up with some friends to watch the fireworks at 9, then head over to Pleasure Island to go to The Adventurer's Club and meet up with even more friends over there. So we did wander around at first. We headed down to the resort's beach and grabbed some pina coladas. Then we walked from the Polynesian to the Grand Floridian, and passed a wedding taking place in the wedding pavilion between the two resorts. Then we hung out in the GF lobby for awhile, just people-watching.
It was then, while we were in the GF lobby, that he told me what the plan was for the rest of the night. As touched as I was at all of his planning and scheming for me, I had to tell him that Pleasure Island was just too expensive to ask our friends to pay! It's $21 just for cover charge, then drinks are horribly expensive on top of that. At that point, both Rick and Betsy texted him and said they couldn't make it. Betsy had a migraine, and Rick had some unexpected financial things come up and just couldn't afford it. We thought about canceling the PI portion of the night and just going someplace cheaper, like Copper Rocket in Maitland. But just about that time, we found out Manny, Stephanie, and Ryan were already on Disney property. And then Tadd found out from the GF concierge desk that PI now allows for you to pay a much cheaper cover charge if you only plan on going to one club. So we decided to forge ahead.
We headed back to the Polynesian and met up with Ryan, Manny, and Stephanie to wait for the fireworks. It turned out the information that Tadd got was wrong, and they wouldn't go off until 10pm. That was too late for the rest of our plans, since we had to meet up with Bet at PI and if we waited, we would miss some of the first events at the Adventurer's Club. That meant that poor Ryan, Manny, and Stephanie came all the way to the Polynesian for nothing. But they were all hungry, so we headed over to the snack bar and they got some food. Manny also got me a really cute birthday cupcake with Mickey sprinkles, which I thought was a sweet gesture, with the night going as horribly wrong as it had so far. We hung out for awhile until everyone was finished eating, and then we all drove over to Pleasure Island.
It turns out that Britney Spears, of all people, was playing at House Of Blues in Downtown Disney. So in order to get to the Adventurer's Club, we had to endure the traffic, and throngs of people, who came to see Britney. Ugh. It actually wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, but it was still a hassle. We FINALLY got to the Adventurer's Club. Bet had called and said he was almost there, so we decided to go in and have him meet up with us inside. We get in line to get inside and the two castmembers there checking IDs tells us that the Adventurer's Club is excluded from the reduced single-club cover charge, so in order to get inside, we have to each pay $21. I don't think so. At this point, Tadd is beside himself, embarrased, frustrated, and upset at how this night he has planned is going. My heart goes out to him, because I can tell he feels awful. So we go to plan B...let's call Bet really quick and tell him to go to Universal instead of Disney, then we can all meet back up at The Groove over there (where cover is only $7 and drinks are expensive, but not insanely so). We call Bet, and then the whole way back to the car, Tadd is apologizing to everyone. Poor guy. I could tell that Manny and Stephanie were miserable at how the night was going. Ryan is much more go-with-the-flo, so he was fine, but I felt awful because I knew Manny and Stephanie were truely hating the way things were going.
So we drive back through the Britney traffic, and head over to Universal. We meet back up with everyone at The Groove, and finally I start relaxing and having fun. We had made arrangements that Stephanie could get a ride back with one of us (Bet and Ryan both live very close to her and Manny's house, but Tadd and I also would have gladly brought her home if for whatever reason they couldn't), since Manny had to be at the station to DJ his 1am radio show. At the time that we had offered, she had thanked us for making the arrangements and seemed really cool with the idea of staying. But barely over an hour or so into the time we had gotten to The Groove, Manny got up to leave and Stephanie was leaving to go with him. We couldn't convince her to stay. I guess my night had sucked that badly. I'll be honest...I was somewhat crushed that she left so early when I had thought she was staying until the end. I know all our plans had gotten screwed up horribly, but I had really hoped to have some time with my best friend, since I hadn't seen her in months. So, they left, and then our group, which was supposed to be a festive group of 8 was down to four people: me, my husband, my brother, and Bet.
At that point, I started weeping a little bit, upset that for the second year in a row, my birthday had turned into an utter mess. Yes, it was an ugly moment of wallowing in utter self-pity, but if I were to tell the story honestly, that is what happened. The guys all did their best to cheer me up, and eventually I just got that "screw it" attitude and made the best of the rest of the night. We hung out in the Red Room for awhile, and Bet and Ryan took turns buying me drinks, and we took lots of silly pictures with Bet's camera. We went out on the balcony for awhile, then back inside to the Green Room. By then, I was relaxed and enjoying myself again.
They announced last call, and Bet asked if anyone was hungry. No one really wanted the night to end, so we decided to go to Steak N Shake. We drove to the one in Winter Park, got out of the car, and a waitress yells across the parking lot that they are drive-through only, and it's closed to dine-in customers. What?!?! Steak N Shake is known for being 24-hours! So we shrug our shoulders and drive to the closest Denny's, which was happy to take our business. We feasted on greasy diner food and laughed about our antics earlier in the evening. Bet amused the waitress by ordering TWO english muffins to go with his giant plate of every breakfast food known to man. Then, of course, he got too full and can't eat the second english muffin, so we laughed at him for that. We pay our bill around 3:30am, say our goodbyes to Ryan and Bet, and head home. I am asleep before my head hits the pillow.
So that was my birthday celebration. It was upsetting and frustrating that things didn't work out the way they were supposed to, but I was moved at how Tadd attempted to plan a wonderful evening for me, and how my brother and Bet did their best to cheer me up when I was sad. It's times like those that really warm your heart and make you realize that there are people out there who really care about me. You know when you're at your lowest moment, they will be there for you.
Birthday celebration last night was somewhat of a disaster. For the second year in a row. At least this year my pet goldfish didn't die. I'm starting to think my birthdays are cursed. In the end, I still managed to have a good time, with some serious cheering up from Tadd, Bet, and Ryan. I'll elaborate more later. Right now I have to get ready to go to my parents' house for our little family celebration. I'm sure this one will be much less disasterous.
I will be getting ready for my birthday get-together in about an hour. I still don't know what Tadd has planned. All I know is that I should be ready by 4pm, dressed nice but not to dressy, and wearing stylish yet somewhat comfortable shoes. I also know that we are going to a few different places. I'm very curious about what we're doing, but I've managed to not find out thus far.
I went out this morning and bought a new shirt at the mall for tonight, which was a task. Lately, I hate every article of clothing I have, so I keep going out and buying stuff here and there. I just feel like I look terrible in everything. But I think the shirt I got today is at least somewhat cute. I got it at NY & Co. It's a sheer black flowy thing with the outlines of a few flowers in silver on one side. The bottom hem has wide rouched elastic band, which helps it not look quite so shapeless. The boatneck neckline is extra-wide, so you can kind of casually let it slide off one shoulder. I'm wearing it with dark boot-cut jeans, black flats, and either a black fabric headband or some sparkly bobby pins. I hope I look ok, and not like the icky shapeless blob I think I look like in my head.
So I'm turning 26 on Tuesday. When my mother was 26, she had one kid (me) and one on the way (my brother Ryan). She had been married for four years and a homeowner for three. At least I have the married-thing down! Eh, I'm not really too worried about the rest. We'll get there soon enough. But it is interesting thinking back and comparing. I'm not quite as hung up on age as other people in my peer group tend to be. I guess sometimes I feel old, but most times I don't even think about it. Maybe I'll change my tune in four years when I'm getting ready to turn 30. Who knows.
Well, I guess I'd better start getting ready for my big night.
