The Art of Birthday-ing

I just wrapped up a two week long birthday celebration with a girls' night out courtesy of my college roommates. I partied it up this year as I turned ... well ... I haven't decided how old I'm going to be yet ...

Birthday proper found me bringing my favorite cake (that Q helped me bake) to work. I got really busy with meetings and ended up eating a piece of cake for lunch. Which I followed up with a popcorn chaser (because popcorn Friday). Then we had pizza for dinner. And on Saturday, my dad got an ice cream cake for us to celebrate. We'll go ahead and say this is not The Year of Kale.

On Saturday, my parents, sister, Fiona, and I went to Beauty and the Beast at the Chanhassen Dinner Theatre (Mike says our group was "four beauties and a beast"). It was Fiona's second play with us and she was super excited. Until she decided that it might be scary. I spent the first 20 minutes of the play trying to extract her face from my armpit. But once she stopped being ridiculous and watched the play, she loved it. Our sensitive girl feels all the feels. At the end of the first act, she exclaimed loudly, "He's [the Beast] not scary, he's sad!" And then when Gaston and the Beast fought near the end, the tears were rolling down her face. Quickly replaced by wonder when the Beast transformed. Auntie was exhausted just watching Bugs!

The most memorable part of the day was when the play ended and we walked to the door. There was a torrential downpour outside - and a very very long line of cars to drive up to the door for pick up. So I grabbed Bugs, ignored the dissension from Grandma and Auntie, and started running to the car. You guys, we were SO wet! It was so funny and totally worth the downpour dash.

Then this last week, Mom made another trip down and she, Em, and I went to Maks and Val On Tour ... which makes sense to anyone who watches Dancing with the Stars. Against all odds (and rush hour traffic), we pulled into the parking garage at the same time! We had enough time for a lovely dinner together and then took the short walk to the State Theater. It was so much fun - with such great company. I thought Em was going to die when they pulled someone from the audience to dance with Maks and that person got a double Chmerkovskiy kiss. I'm pretty sure I could do at least seven of the moves they did on stage - so I'm basically on deck as a back up dancer!

It's August 1 and Quinn has informed me that it is now her birthday month! The birthday crown has officially been passed.