Happy Birthday to Me!

I turned 36 a couple weeks ago, so now I'm closer to 40 than I am to 30! But I'm okay with that, because Dave is 2 years older than me and 36 seems a heck of a lot younger than 38. 

I had a great birthday. I took pictures of Chloe in the morning. That always makes me happy. Then I went to lunch with Kristen and a friend who shares my birthday. Nathan watched our toddlers, so that was lovely. It was a gorgeous day, and we ate outside (for both lunch and dinner).

After the kids got home I took a nap with Chloe, and then I relaxed in the hammock while Dave grilled dinner.

We had Mexican chicken and veggie kabobs with rice and pineapple. Scrumptious!

We like to cook all the meat together and all the veggies together (less cross-contamination, plus more control over cooking times). But the kids love the idea of eating off the skewers, so we let them reassemble them.

There's a lady at Dave's work who likes to make cakes (or whatever dessert people want) for all the birthdays. Somehow she knew my birthday was coming up, so she offered to make something for me too. Wasn't that nice? Anyway, I requested lemon bars because I love them but Dave doesn't, so I never make them. They were yummy!

For my birthday dinner date we went to our favorite new restaurant downtown called Estrella. It was another beautiful evening, and we ate outside. We even left Chloe with my mom, making it our first real date since she was born.

We had the family over for dinner the following Sunday, which was great because now my dad has Sundays off work. I love this picture of my mom with Chloe. She's so beautiful, and I love how Chloe is looking up at her.

I couldn't decide what kind of cake to make, so I ended up making 2 different kinds of cupcakes with 3 different toppings. I made strawberry cupcakes (from scratch) with graham cracker crust, cream cheese frosting and graham cracker sprinkles on top, and white cake mix cupcakes with a brownie crust (half with cream cheese frosting and the other half with peanut butter frosting). I made 48 large brownies and 24 minis, and we actually had a few leftover. Cupcakes are great for a crowd because there is  no cutting/dishing up ice cream/dirtying more plates and forks. I should do that more often.

For my birthday I bought Lightroom (a photo editing/organizing computer program), but I can't use it until we order a new computer because our CD ROM doesn't work (among many other things, including a bad mother board). Hopefully we will get it soon! Kristen gave me cute yellow flower earrings and a 4 different kinds of syrups. We've enjoyed them on pancakes, waffles, ice cream sundays and even chocolate lava cakes.