It's My Birthday

In celebration of today, 42 things about my birthday:

1. My sixth birthday is the most memorable because that's the one when David was born. No one knew if he'd live past that day, but he did and I've always been thankful for that. 

2. Yesterday I realized that my 21st birthday was 21 years ago!! I've been unsettled ever since. 

3. I was living in London on my 21st birthday, in a row house on Tooting Broadway. I opened an amazing care package from my family - full of balloons and other fun things and I got phone calls from a lot of special people. I spent the evening scouring all the corner shops for the makings of tacos. I think I finally found pita bread, or some kind of flatbread, and some black beans, but I don't think the result could actually qualify as tacos. 

4. I celebrated my 21st birthday with my mom, dad and Kristin a couple weeks earlier in Paris. We had a beautiful (rum) cake. 

5. When I was a teenager I felt somewhat special to know I shared a birthday with Michael Jackson. 

6. I found out this morning that I also share my birthday with The Onion.

7. I was born on a Sunday and Salt Lake City was flooded that day.

8. My birthday was often on the first day of school.

9. On my 15th birthday I came home from school and saw a Rolls Royce in our driveway. My dad was borrowing it from a jeweler for a photo session.

10. In 2005 there was Hurricane Katrina. It wasn't a good day, knowing what was going on in New Orleans. Devastating. 

11. In 2007 I had four cakes!

12. The birthday I celebrated as a missionary, in 1993, was great because I was in Loughborough with a good companion and a lot of good investigators that threw me a couple parties. I also got a package from home with a puzzle that was a photo of the cake my family had made me and a box of Oreo cookies.

13. I keep this card from my mom and dad in my desk drawer and look at it often. I think it's the last birthday card I got that was written by my dad.


14. My dad made some really smashing birthday cakes! (Mine were always great, but I think Kristin's were AMAZING.)

15. August is the only month of the year that doesn't have a nationally recognized holiday of some sort, so I always considered my birthday to be the holiday in August.

16. When I was young, my birthday actually felt like a holiday most of the time. There was always an air of festivity and excitement.

17. Grandma Jessie, Mimi and Jack used to come for every birthday - all of our birthdays, which helped make it a special occasion.

18. On my 17th birthday, my mom sent balloons to school for me. I was in English class when they arrived and, even though it was very nice, I was tres embarrassed.

19. We were in Lake Powell on my 40th birthday. It was a hot and busy day as we arrived and set up our camp, but that night Chris took me and one of our little nephews (it may have been Kade) out on the boat and I remember wakeboarding just as the sun was going down and I remember how beautiful the scene was and how perfect the water was and feeling happy.

20. If I had to pick a favorite kind of birthday cake it'd be German Chocolate.

21. When I turned 6, on top of getting a baby brother, I got my first bike. And a trip to Burger King for dinner. I still don't know how my dad managed to pull off the surprise of the bike with everything else that was going on that day.

22. When I turned 7 I got a skateboard. It was orange.

23. I've always thought of the number 29 as my lucky number.

24. When I turned 8 we had a picnic in Provo Canyon. My friend Jodie, who had just moved to Canada, was with us. I've wanted to have another picnic in the canyon on my birthday, but it hasn't happened yet.

25. My half-birthday is on Leap Day! When I was in third grade I mentioned this to my teacher and she somehow misunderstood me and told the class that my birthday was on Leap Day. Despite my horror and shyness, I had to correct her. Last year on Leap Day I made a big deal of it on Twitter and ended up with a giant cookie that had my name on it - in honor of my half-birthday!

26. Part of the reason I have vivid memories of many of my birthdays is because my dad was so good at taking pictures. Thankful for that.

27. My mom usually get sentimental around my birthday, which I love. My family has five birthdays between August 29th and September 29th.

28. I have to admit that I was dreading entering my 40s. It sounded old and distancing, but now I think it's a good place to be and 42 is not a bad number!

About Today's Birthday

29. Jordan left me a nice note!

30. I spent the morning at the 5th/6th Grade Open House at Jemma's school. It was cute how all the parents sat in their kids' desks in the classroom and the kids sat on their laps while Mrs. Day gave us an overview of 5th grade.

31. I went to work, but spent most of my time in meetings and skipped out early, leaving a lot of unread emails behind.

32. My work friends gave me some gifts: LeAnn gave me a doodle journal, Mary gave me a gift card to Target, Suzanne gave me a snazzy shower cap from Dry Bar (wish we had a Dry Bar in the neighborhood) and Jeff gave me an awesome book. (I haven't read it yet, but I know it'll be awesome.)

33. My team took me out for sushi at lunchtime.

34. I got to play with Google Glass!!

35. Jordan's friends also left me a note, which I thought was nice...until I found out they'd pushed their way into the house and made hamburgers for lunch - without Jordan.

36. Jemma and I got our nails done.

37. We met up with Mom at the Pizza Factory for dinner. Pizza, pasta and those delicioso garlic bread twists!

38. We took a bunch of pictures.

39. We ended up at a wedding reception for Cam's brother Adam.

40. The band was great and Jemma did a lot of dancing.

41. I hijacked some wedding cake and one of the candles and called it my birthday cake.

42. And last, but certainly not least, Chris got a haircut!!