THE CANNON FAMILY: Birthday Buddies

Our birthday's have really become more of a nuisance than anything else these days. Maybe we've become boring, but we never get each other gifts anymore and just count our patio or new front steps as our way of rewarding ourselves for living yet another year. The one thing that always happens is some breakfast in bed. Chase cracked me up this year. While he was eating his french toast, he also decided some Grateful Dead should be playing too. How much do I love this guy? ALOT!!!

I love watching him strum his air guitar. I love him for many reasons which I have already stated in this blog but truly every year, I love him even more. He also gets better looking every year, which is kind of unfair but also fair because I get to look at him. We went out with some friends that night at our favorite trailer park. Can't think of a better way to celebrate one's birthday than eating under some patio lights, at a picnic table, under the starts, and on a warm spring night with your buddies.

Fast forward a week, and I got some french toast in bed too!! My birthday also landed on a Saturday which meant I got to sleep in (which is all I ever really want on my birthday anyway:-).

The older I get, the more I realize birthdays aren’t days to be celebrated unless you are under 30. After that, you either forget it’s your birthday (happened this year to me) or have to actually count on your fingers to figure out how old you are. When Chase walked in with the breakfast tray, a light bulb went off and I remembered, oh ya, it’s my birthday!! I had already celebrated with my friends a week before (Macy made me spice cake.....my favorite:-) and went out to dinner with some couples the night before, so I felt I had been overly celebrated at this point anyway.

The 19^th fell on a Saturday which meant lots of soccer games, friend’s baptisms, birthday parties, and a ward Easter egg hunt. The good news is, the Friday before was Good Friday so Chase didn’t have to work. I decided to take FULL advantage of this day of freedom and went shopping BY MYSELF all day. It was glorious. Chase asked if I wanted to invite a friend with me. I responded with a resounding NO!! Shopping with friends was fun in high school when you weren’t confident enough to pick a shirt without approval from the fashion police (would this plaid shirt look better tied around my waist, or this plaid shirt?). Now, shopping with friends is absolute torture!!! If you find something that is garment worthy and modest, your friends want to buy it too because modesty in this world is a rare find indeed.

The other reason I dislike shopping with friends is because I only have so much time before I have to go back home to feed my children dinner or go to bed. I don’t have time to sit on a chair in the dressing room and wait for someone else to try something on (just get the plaid shirt and lets go!!!). So, when I go shopping by myself on my birthday, don’t “Cry For Me Argentina.” Know that I am in a state of complete relaxed and joyous bliss!! I go where I want to go. I try on whatever the heck I want to try on. I don’t have to feed anyone or lug around a diaper bag.

This “shopping spree” of sorts has become a tradition. Last year I left my house at 10 a.m. and didn’t get home until 6:00 p.m!! It was glorious!!! When you don’t have to shuffle kids around, you can get sooooooooooo much more accomplished. The only funny thing that happened was when I was standing in line at Forever 21 around 5, I started to sway and feel a bit lightheaded. I realized at that moment that my stomach kind of hurt too. I was trying so hard to utilize the ONE DAY of the year I had to myself that I completely forgot to eat!! Good news is, I’m a mommy, so even with no kids in tow, I had a granola bag in my purse. Can’t go anywhere with out a cliff bar or some goldfish crackers!! This year's shopping spree was every bit as fun. I remembered to pack more snacks this time around.

So after my breakfast in bed, we raced out the door to Jack's soccer game and the rest of the day was packed with baptisms and birthday parties. The ward Easter egg hunt was how we wrapped up the evening.