Well, this past Monday I began what I am calling the Fortnight of Birthday! 

Monday I spent the day with my mom (without my children). I went to her house early and I wanted to look through some old family items and photographs. She made us a cup of cappucino and a piece of blackberry pound cake and we settled in. We spent the morning looking through her mother's photo albums (my grandmother passed away in 1993 from lung cancer).  We talked about pictures of things we remembered and Mom shared family stories with me.

Then we went to see Lady in the Lake. I was expecting scary, which it wasn't, but we really enjoyed the story and were very glad we went to see it. Then we went to Cold Stone Creamery for a late lunch. I had the Coffee Lover's Ice Cream...my tongue is still happy from that adventure. Then we went back to her house and finished looking through photo albums and just sat around and talked.

Tuesday the children and I were supposed to visit friends, but they called and had a sick child, so I took advantage of that and got some work done here that needed to be done.

Wednesday was movie/pool day (see previous post for more details on that).

Thursday we got to stay at home and again do home things (I did ads for VaBay, we did some cleaning, the kids did schoolwork) and then we played some games. I finally beat the Game Master at Stratego (I am not the best at Strategy games) and then we played a rousing game of Pokemon Trainer and I won that too (I think they let me win because it was my birthday coming up. I have noticed they have been very nice to me).

Yesterday morning I mowed the yard, then did some VaBay work, then after lunch, headed to town and my Dad's cabin. My Dad bought 50 acres of land against national forest 10 years ago. He had been taking care of the place for a friend since 1980 and the friend was killed in a plane accident in 1996 (the plane Ron Brown crashed on). Bob's wife wanted to sell the place and gave Dad the first option since he loved it so there.  There is a creek, two cabins, and lots of peace and quiet and beauty. So we went to visit my dad and his wife, Dianne there. They fixed me homemade cherry ice cream and zucchini cake in honor of my birthday. And they gave me a bag of neat knick-knack items for around the house.  We visited for a few hours, the children played in the COLD creek and then we headed towards home. We stopped in Bedford for groceries and it was after 7, so I took the kids to McDonalds. We were going through the drive thru...we waited 25 minutes in line!!!!!!  They kept apologizing. They were having a tough time because some people hadn't shown up for work. That gave me a good opportunity to talk with Game Master and Jungle Princess about how important it was to show up to work when you were scheduled to do so.

This morning, I left about 7:30 am to head to the DMV. Fortunately, I received a notice yesterday about my tags needing renewal in a couple of months which reminded me that I needed to renew my driver's license!!!!! So in I went for my new picture. I told the nice lady that I didn't think it was fair that for my birthday I had to pay the DMV money...she laughed and agreed.

The lady who took my picture complimented me on my hairstyle (she went on and on about it) and said how different I looked from my last picture (in a good way). That made me feel good. I came home and fixed Game Master some pancakes and now I am blogging for the first time in days because I have been toooo busy!  We are supposed to go see Pirates of the Caribbean this afternoon and then head to my Mom's for my birthday supper there. We are having steak (my stepdad, Jim, makes awesome steak) and we are having baked potatoes, salad, homemade rolls, German Chocolate Cake and homemade ice cream.

Tomorrow my in-laws are coming over after church and I am cooking a nice Sunday dinner for them. Then Monday I will turn 40. I am excited about turning 40. I still feel like I did when I was 20 (in my head that is, my body doesn't quite feel the same). I am thankful to be alive and healthy.

My hubby and kids have some presents for me on Monday and my hubby has said there is something going on next weekend, but I don't know what yet.

I love birthdays!