Birthdays!

I love birthdays - mine, Bill's, my kids, my parents, friends, random people I meet on the street, my manicurist who seemed a little put off by how happy I was for her 21st birthday when she seemed so ho-hum about it. Every since I was a little girl, it just felt like that one special day when it's completely okay to think of myself and accept a little extra attention. And no matter how everything else is going in life, if the days leading up to the big birthday are not so good, I feel like I at least get that one day to forget it all and celebrate.

Bill thinks I'm crazy but I can actually remember every single birthday I've ever had. I think I remember my 1st birthday too but that would be too crazy right? Here are some of my birthday highlights.

1st - Sitting in a high chair and my mom putting cake on my nose
3rd - BBQ in the backyard, my best friend Bumper
6th - Disneyland
7th - Pink bicycle that matched my best friend Gina's
8th, 9th & 10th - Skating rink!!!
13th - Move to a new city and my only 3 friends in the entire city still make it an amazing day
16th - Dad drove me around the city blindfolded and had a surprise party at a restaurant with friends and family.
18th - Another new car before heading off to college. The Toyota Tercel which Bill would later smash the hood of with his ass after I just met him.
21st - Vegas
26th - 1st birthday as a Mommy
29th - Pink party!
34th - Today :)

Rambling and Doctor Talk

I ended up buying the 4th pair of those glasses because I thought they had the full-on geek factor I wanted. I was waffling between those and #1 since those seemed cuter. But I like the ones I picked. Ordered some prescription sunglasses too.

I've had a rough-ish week. Battling an illness that seemed to never want to leave my system and anxiety on top of that probably made it even worse. Sometimes I feel like I just invite anxiety when it's not needed. Granted, anxiety is never "needed". But being anxious about important things feels justified where in my case lately the stupidness entering my brain was just that - stupid. I said it all out loud to Bill and while hoping to calm myself ended up firing me up even more. I don't know what will come of this.

Despite all of this bullshit swirling in my head, my life right now really is amazing because I have the best family ever. I love my husband and my kids and they are freaking awesome. And my birthday is coming up on the 12th AND I got a Nook color yesterday as an early gift. It is ssweeeet. I like Bill's iPad but I didn't really want one. I kind of wanted an e-reader but I didn't like the screens on most of them. But the Nook color has a screen like an iPad and it has some other cool iPad-ish features, like a web browser and apps. (Woot Pandora!) Plus it was only $250 as opposed to $600. So yeah I like it. A lot.

Now to news I've been wanting to blab about for the last month... Bill is going back to school... to be a doctor. It is super exciting for us. He has found his calling and is so motivated and inspired to do it. And it makes me so happy for him. He will be in school for a long time but if we work it out by him joining the military, then his school will be paid for and we'll have a little bit of a cushion there financially since he won't be able to work full-time once he actually starts medical school. We are really comfortable right now in his current job and our lives but we are obviously not the kind of people are who satisfied with being just content. Although it's certainly nice for a while. We have both gone through life enjoying the moment but looking toward the future and considering what we can accomplish in the grander scheme of things.

Why are we here and what is our purpose in life and on this earth? These are things I think about and helps put my thoughts and life in perspective when I worry about things that are so trivial. And then my brain explodes.

This is the most random post ever.

Anyway - I'm very proud of Bill for choosing this path, especially at age 34 when some people think you should have it all figured out by now. He's going to love being a doctor and will be so good at it.

I feel like my brain just took a dump on my blog.

Which glasses should I get?

I really want some black geeky glasses.

Inspiration...

So here are the ones I'm choosing from. I think I know which ones I want but if you care to share your opinion, please let me know which I should pick. And if you don't think I should get any of them, well... then keep that opinion to yourself, haha.

1

2

3

4

Thanks!

The August Break

Saw this on Dee's blog and I'm going to do it too. The August Break.

I love August. Birthdays, school starting, last days of summer.

Thinking of Fall already

I've been delaying posting since we got back from vacation because I'm overwhelmed trying to catch up on the last few weeks via blog. I think I'm just going to skip it. We had a wonderful vacation, it was a beautiful wedding, I posted lots of pictures and updates to facebook so there you have that. Moving on to new things (are you okay with this? I think I am.) ...

Today is going to be a bullet post and I'm going to get back on track tomorrow with regular posting. Getting this out of the way.

• Did I already say it was an awesome wedding? Well it was.
• Booked our hotel in Kansas City for Vann's wedding. Just need to get plane tickets but seeing them for $200 a piece roundtrip so that's pretty cool. Can't wait to see Vann and Matt again, and watch another happy wedding.
• Looking forward to SuperJenn's wedding in September. We don't have to travel far for this one. Gotta shop for a dress!
• Planning another trip to Boston in November with Jennie and Beth this time too! Wardrobe planning is #1 priority for this one. Compiling lists of style inspirations. Yep.
• Getting a haircut today. I'm totally not showing you guys a picture of what I'm getting in case you think I'm joking and yell at me not to get it. It's going to be good though. I promise. I WILL post a pic after.
• I've been on a mad crocheting hat spree. Made one for Bill, one for me, two for Allison's daughters, one for my Dad and working on another for me. This may be a hat Christmas instead of a scarf Christmas this year. I hope everyone likes hats.
• My birthday is in 15 days. I know what I want but Bill is getting me something I didn't ask for, although it's probably something I asked for before that we both forgot about it until now. This may actual be a surprise even though of course I've been guessing because I'm a ruiner of surprises. I know he's not getting me boots though so I'm listing that at the top of my wishlist. I like these.

This color is cognac but I like every color. In case you were wondering.

Okay that's enough bullet updating for today. More real posting tomorrow.

Guess what? It's hot in Phoenix.

The boys and I have been in Phoenix now since last Wednesday. Guess what? It's freaking hot here. We've mostly stayed inside except for swimming. Although it seemed like every time we got into the pool there was a mini-dust storm. The winds picked up and the sky got all crazy. Right when the kids got out of the pool the other day, it actually rained... for about 15 minutes. Yesterday it was 102 (as opposed to 118 earlier this week) and it actually felt cool to us - how warped is that?!

The first few days we were in town, Bill and I got some time together to celebrate an early anniversary - thanks to Aunt T and Uncle B for watching the boys, who apparently all had a wonderful time too.

Bill and I swam, ate good food (sushi and Mexican), shopped at H&M, and saw one good movie - Super 8. If you haven't seen it and love movies like E.T. or pretty much anything Spielberg, watch it. May be one of my favorite movies ever. I'm letting it sink in but I LOVED it.

I also caved and watched Transformers in 3D for Bill and afterwards he apologized for making me endure what might have been the crappiest movie I've EVER seen. I'm sure there are worse movies out there but I haven't seen them or I've stopped watching them as soon as I realized how bad they were. I thought Shia would have made it bearable but he wasn't enough. I slept through parts of it hoping it would be over when I woke up - didn't work. At one point I asked Bill when it would be over and he said "40 more minutes" and I almost lost it. I looked around and people were actually enjoying it. What kind of black hole did I fall into?

I hate that I spent a longer paragraph talking about a Michael Bay movie than a JJ Abrams movie.

Where we spent our time half of Thursday.

Complimentary dessert from the hotel

The boys' birdhouses they painted while we were gone.

Lego Nintendo creations

The joy of reading

When I was little, I read ALL THE TIME. And I mean, every second that I could squeeze into my life.

At bedtime, I would have a flashlight tucked away under my pillow so I could read under the covers. If I was brave enough, I'd sneak into the closet and read. I always got caught but it was worth it. Although I never really got into trouble over it, except for the lectures from my Mom about hurting my eyes. (Hence, glasses by age 11.)

Car trips were my favorite because it meant that I had more time to read. I couldn't bring a flashlight for night-time driving since it was too distracting for my Dad. But I read until the very last ray of light filled the sky.

At school, I'd finish my work early just so I had time to read at my desk. Sometimes we'd be assigned to read from a page from our textbooks and I'd go ahead and read the entire chapter. Once I finished that, I'd hold my textbook up and read my own book inside of it.

Now almost 34 years old, I almost feel like that little girl again having to sneak in time to read because I have so much else to do.

Lately I've been reading on my iPhone because it's handy when I'm waiting at the DMV or sitting with the kids while they watch Power Rangers. But I enjoy actual books more. I just finished reading Hunger Games - a real book and everything! I bought Catching Fire and Mockingjay yesterday at Target, which I plan to read this week while on "vacation" in Phoenix. And for this short episode in my semi-hectic life, I will read uninterrupted.

And it will be awesome.