Hello Monday - 53

 

It's been a minute (or three) since I've connected with Sarah and Holly - I read each week, just don't find the time to write and link up.  Since I now work in a "bankers hours" industry I find myself with a little extra time this morning!  So happy to NOT have to go anywhere - this is the current weather situation:

Reverse those numbers and I'm a happy, happy camper (even when clouds are present, even at 6:30 in the morning). . .this, on the other hand, especially without sunshine, is a little more difficult to wake up to.  I do try to keep it all in perspective though - I keep locations of all my other family members saved and my sister & mom are sitting at "13 degrees but feels like -1" right now so I'll take what I have!  We'll see if the snow happens - we've had a TON of rain, can there be any precipitation left??

Last weekend I celebrated #53 and it was a good one!  Much to our youngest's dismay we never did a family dinner/get together but we are moving out of that season of life when people aren't just "around" on the weekends to make things like that happen.  I'm incredibly thankful that it's important to my kiddos that we celebrate one another with big events and birthdays - I hope they all continue to do that throughout their lives.

This really is turning into a "birthday month"!  The weekend before last Barbara and I celebrated with a dinner out with the Bells, Tom, and Tommy.

Afterwards we all wonder why we don't go to Carrabba's more??  Our food was really good and we happened to hit at Happy Hour, hence the "special" drinks :). They delivered us a couple terrific desserts to share, but I failed to get a picture - with 6 of us they were gone pretty fast - ha!

A week ago Thursday I had scheduled a trip to Cookeville for work since I knew I was heading up to Ohio that day - might as well go from there as easily as Knoxville.  The really special part of the day was when Laura came down from Clarksville to see me!!

It was a quick visit, but oh-so-nice to hug her neck and spend some time with her.  We went to a coffee shop then there was a really cute bookstore next to it that we browsed through.  They had a puzzle table set up - we had wished that we had gone there after our coffee and worked on that while we chatted.  I miss doing puzzles with her here at home.  Well, I miss a lot about her not being around but she is loving campus ministry with Chi Alpha at Austin Peay so I'm happy of course.  We'll see what this year brings for her :)

I headed up to Ohio in some tremendous storms - there was about a 20-minute lightening storm through KY (in February!) then apparently a tornado came through the route I usually take up I-75 so it was a good call to head up from middle TN instead of east TN that night.  I arrived at my mom's about 11:30 and stayed up until 1 a.m.!  I don't remember the last time I saw that time on a clock - ha!

I worked from her house on Friday then we went out for my birthday dinner in Montgomery that evening.  My sister had recommended Kitchen Social - it was excellent!  Highly, highly recommend.

We had a really nice time together.

I generally get "family resemblance" comments with these pictures - take a look at my sister, mom, and cousin the weekend before when they were together:

I used to not be able to tell my aunt and mother apart on the phone. . .people would say that about my sister and myself too.  It's fun to be part of a family with such strong family genetics.

Saturday February 8th was probably my favorite birthday day of all, though.  I met my dad and Virginia for breakfast in Dayton 

And then took Virginia over to Homegoods - she had never been!!  She is such a shopper - I was surprised.  Dad and I got another picture in the store because he loves the hat she had recently bought him -

We didn't even make it through 25% of the store though (despite being there for over 30 minutes!) before I had to leave to meet someone I had recently reconnected with after I went on a trip down memory lane in my previous blog post - Tom Harrison!

It was so, so, so good to see him!!  I really can't remember the last time we connected - his girls, that I used to babysit, are 37 and 42 years old - wow!!  His wife was pregnant with their second when I had my back surgery freshman year of high school.  He has an incredibly memory - when I was showing him the above pictures of my dad and me he said, "oh, yea, he's a lefty".  Crazy, right?  He even remembered what year I graduated from high school - really, really good memory :). 

Anyway, he gave me a copy of the book he has written - what a treasure it is!!  I am so lucky to know people like Tom.

After breakfast with my dad and visiting with Tom at his courts I headed to my favorite store, DLM, and picked up soup for a family friend and my mom and me for dinner that night as well as assorted other goodies to bring home to share :)

I headed to Barb's house with soup and a Laura's cookie for her, and *did* take a picture for my sister of us together, in response to a picture my sis had sent while I was there (she was skiing with her family in Tahoe that weekend) but told Barb I wouldn't share the picture.  She's recently widowed and is doing good (it's all relative, right?) but not ready for the world yet.  She is such a very special person.  Again, someone I knew in high school, like Tom Harrison (and MY Tom for that matter - ha!), and it's just so, so good to sit and visit and catch up with everyone.  I was blessed with so many terrific adults in my teen years, truly.

Saturday night my mom and I hung out, ate soup, 

enjoyed seeing Sadie on her new bed (one of my purchases earlier in the day with Virginia at HomeGoods)

and made it to bed before 11 p.m. since I wanted to be on the road before 7 a.m. on my actual birthday to have time with my family at home.

I did a whole hour-by-hour thing for my birthday, just for my sake - 

My first 5 hours. . .that was the weather I was (thankfully) leaving. . .and then a very easy drive home.

I got to have lunch with these people that I love so very much:

Although the kids want it noted that the flowers were NOT from Tom - ha!!  Yes, they know how much I like having fresh flowers in the house so they brought them with them to Super Chix (my request for a birthday lunch)

It was a bright, sun-shiney afternoon, complete with a trip to a local park we don't visit often with the doggies and Bells then home for gifts from my inlaws, Tom, and the girls.  The boys purchased a new Vols quarter-zip for me that was back-ordered - it was a great way to spend my day :)

The last hours of the day were spent (kind of watching) the Superbowl, reading, enjoying a Laura's cookie. . .not much.  The hour-by-hour pictures were getting slim at this point. . apparently I came across the following during the evening and thought it was important enough to screenshot - a good reminder, right?

Maybe a little "heavy" but birthdays always bring about a reflective mood to, right?

Just to extend #53 as long as possible, Stephen's girlfriend invited us over to her parent's house for dinner Saturday (first time meeting them!) and she made me my favorite chocolate cake!  

One more birthday dinner to go next week. . .I have a friend organizing Birthday Friends dinners once a month this year and this month my tennis friend Gaby and I chose the Chop House for our gathering.

Off to see what this day holds!  The sun is kind of out. . .Tom is off today also and home from an early morning dentist appointment.  Erin's accounting firm works through all holidays from Jan 2nd - April 15th so she was up-and-out early.  Stephen's working from home and I've got pickleball tonight. . .always nice to have a day to just "be".  Happy Monday All!  Head over to Sarah and Holly's blogs to find other bloggers chatting about their weekends :)

Love,

Jenni