25

A quarter of a century, I am. Every birthday is so special. I've somehow been blessed enough to go to sleep at the end of every March 10th feeling loved by the people around me, and this year it happened again.

On Friday night our core group of friends celebrated Gabrielle's birthday. Since mine was on Saturday she pulled me up to stand with her during the singing and blow out candles with her. 

This picture totally outs a bad habit of mine. Does anyone else pick at their fingers when they get nervous? Am I alone in this primal habit? 

Moving on.

On Saturday I woke up and opened packages my parents and sister sent to me. Packages! What a thrill. Just like that time when I was in 5th grade and Mom sent a batch of cookies to me while I was at camp.   Then I ate a donut for breakfast. Happy birthday to me. 

By then Oak Park was starting to heat up for the St. Patrick's Day Parade: streets blocked off, drunken shenanigans at Starbucks at 9am and such. I have to be honest here and admit that I really don't like St. Patrick's Day. It's probably my least favorite holiday along with Halloween. I hope we can still be friends now that you know that. I like other holidays. Probably every single other holiday. 

Tanget?

So after the donut we drove into the city for a much more peaceful ambiance. The weather was clear and beautiful and Tim's surprise lunch for me was at the Hancock Tower Signature Room. The view was breathtaking which means that I couldn't breathe for a second when we stepped off the elevator at the 95th floor of the building where OPRAH ALSO LIVES. She was probably there, somewhere on a floor below us, lounging in her vast lounging rooms with her cocker spaniels. 

The Signature Room is surprisingly affordable and family friendly, and I really liked that about it. All kinds of people were there, including families with little kids who were positively giddy about being so high up. It was a great atmosphere.

I love that Chicago is not landlocked. I feel better when I can see an end to the land and an expanse of water.

My husband. He still feels like my new boyfriend. He's the best guy and I'm so excited to be his girl.

After that we rode the elevator back down 95 floors to the ground level and wandered into the North Face. I've been wanting a new coat that's not my standard black, and I also wanted to wait till Winter was over so I could get it on the cheap. After much agonizing I picked up a white outer shell windbreaker that was on sale and realized I could take my tried and true 4 year old black insulator jacket and zip it into the inside of the white outer shell for a warm winter coat option, or wear the shell alone as for a Spring windbreaker. It was the perfect birthday present and I handed it to Tim and he took it to the counter and bought it and then I put it on for the rest of the day.

Then we went to the Old Town to meander a bit before stepping into A New Leaf, which is basically a cave of botanical wonders. Tim wanted me to pick out a bouquet of flowers to take home because he's sweet like that.

And then we spent the rest of the day at home. Tim played and sang me a beautiful rendition of "Happy Birthday" and we snuggled and ate guacamole.

It was a perfect spontaneous day. 

It's good to be 25. I'm finally feeling like I know a thing or two. I also felt like that at 18, and then I went to college and realized I didn't know anything. I suppose I feel the smartest when I'm not in school.
The end.