Birthday Week

Whew! What a busy week of celebrating! Lots of good food, friends, and family!

It started on Tuesday night when Hailey and Shannon joined me for an early birthday dinner at Jackalope Ranch. We enjoyed our uninterrupted girl time (without the kiddos) and our front row seat to "Two-Steppin' Tuesdays."

Love these trusted girlfriends!

On Wednesday, Morgan and I celebrated our Anniversary (a day early) by dropping the kids off at Grandma and Grandpa's for an overnight. Morgan worked most of the day and I went shopping with some new birthday money. We had reservations at Ruth's Chris for dinner but decided last minute that sushi sounded better. It was a wonderful and relaxing evening together. Best of all at dinner, Morgan gave me a homemade card, it was more like a little book, complete with pictures and a heartfelt letter on the last page. It made me cry- all his cards do. I have such a sweet hubby!

Anniversary dinner at Okura... Yum!

Who's 40?? Okay, okay, I am. Really??

Friday was my actual birthday. Forty years, what a blessing! (more on that later). We were originally supposed to leave for Mexico on the morning of my b-day. We had planned to go down with a group from our church to help build loft houses for those without a home. It was going to be our first family mission trip together and we were very excited. On Tuesday afternoon, we had to make the decision to withdraw from the trip. Unfortunately, only SUV's are allowed on the roads there and due to some other logistics and security reasons, it would be too dangerous for us with the kids. Of course we were bummed but ultimately, we knew that it just wasn't going to work out. It simply wasn't our time or our trip. So, we stayed home and celebrated my birthday by going out to Sammy's for dinner. I was craving their Chicken Caesar Salad. Soooo good!

Here I am after my morning run. I came home to cinnamon rolls, homemade cards, and lots and lots of love.

Birthday dinner at Sammy's.

My free birthday dessert! Hello~ hot fudge sundae...

Happy Birthday to me!

Me and my girlies.

My little family.

Well, since we didn't make it to Mexico, we still wanted to spend some time serving the Lord this weekend as a family. We spent Saturday morning at the Narrow Door, a ministry in our area that serves the poor and feeds the hungry. We cleaned, stacked, swept and assembled. We sweated our tushes off! The girls were so helpful and able to do quite a bit. We were super proud of them and best of all, as we left, they said, "I love helping people. It was so much fun!" I can see us doing this once a month as a family. The girls are at the perfect age for developing a heart and burden for others and it's up to us as parents to make it a "normal" thing.

Cleaning off all the tables before we start stacking food on them.

Teamwork!

Stacking all the food boxes we assembled.

I loved serving the community with my family!