Last week was a very good week.

After my last post about not getting anything done these days, I was blessed with a flurry of activity during Birthiversary week.

Kenta and I had already given each other a gazillion dollars (did you know we were gazillionaires? more like multi-gazillionaires.) worth of food storage. Kenta had packed it all back in April, but we made a special trip down to the basement on our anniversary to admire his handiwork:

Celebrating 5 years of wedded bliss. (And, yes, that is a microwave in our basement.)

Because we have blown most of our cash on such frivolous things as a house, a baby, and food storage, we decided to keep the gifts simple for our/my birthiversary. The kids gave me AN ENTIRE THREE HOURS IN WHICH THEY WERE SIMULTANEOUSLY NAPPING IN PEACE with which I managed to do a little painting, priming, and mending. In fact, I regifted Kenta a shirt that I had given him for our first anniversary. It had gotten a hole in it prematurely, so I patched it up and gave it to him. It's pretty much brand new since it spent the last two years or so sitting in my mending pile. How's that for a thrifty present?

The birthday part of the birthiversary was truly an occasion to remember. My good friend, Jenn, had given birth to twins earlier in the week (one late Monday night, and one ten minutes later - on Tuesday morning! Soooo cool!) I had signed up to feed her family dinner on my birthday months ago (as in, make the food and drop it off to them), but she insisted that I bring my family and celebrate my birthday with them. Uh. Seriously, Jenn? You just had twins and you are offering to host my birthday dinner? But, for anyone who knows the lovely Jenn, there is pretty much no refusing her kindness - the only thing you can do is work out a compromise of sorts. So I made the dinner, Kenta grilled it (kabobs - my favorite!), and she volunteered her husband to make a delicious funfetti cake:

Action shot of the candle blowing (check out the streamers in the back ground - her little girls decorated - so cute!):

The funfetti masterpiece, complete with a layer of strawberries in the middle. (and no, I am not 23 - we used our imaginations to morph the "3" into the proper number).

Thank you, Jenn and family, for the memorable birthday celebration: family, friends, fun, and food. Perfection!

Kenta - not to be out done by the kids' awesome nap gift - declared a celebratory trip to IKEA. Yay!!! We packed everyone up for a trip down to IKEA, so we could find a new computer desk and browse the sofa department. I have no photographic evidence that this trip took place, but let it be known that it was Kenta's idea to gleefully and willingly take us all to IKEA. Thanks, Kenta!!

So that's that. I've finally stopped, uh, "celebrating" my birthday. It usually takes me a week to get the celebrating out of my system ("pssshh..I can have a piece of chocolate after breakfast - it's my birthday chocolate!!"), but all the birthday goodies are gone, the kids are back to their non-simultaneously napping schedule, the special treatment is over, and it's back to life as usual. But it's a great life and I feel extremely blessed to be living it. Happy birthiversary to me!