31

Yes, I had a birthday. I can't neglect to share:) I turned 31 on the 3rd and had a special birthday weekend with my sweet family. Brad let me spend an entire day shopping (that was my birthday request) for some new clothes. I had forgotten how hard shopping was!! I spent 5 hours...yes, 5 hours looking for new items for my wardrobe. It was exhausting...but also vital that I got it all done that day because I knew the opportunity to do this again would not be around the corner.

On Monday, my actual birthday, Brad surprised me with my other request...a picture of all 3 of the girls. I thought it would be great if we could start an annual gift of having them photographed with out ME having to go through the stress, hassle, and circus of getting it done. He took them on his own, without me knowing, and managed to end up with a precious picture of all three girls smiling and looking at the camera. He did this during my shopping spree:) Such a sweet gesture from my hubby because I KNOW it is not easy to do this task with our girls. We also celebrated with a big yummy cookie cake. Caroline was the biggest fan of that I think. She reminded me all week that we "needed to finish off that cake".

My sweet friend Jill had asked me to help her judge a beauty pageant that day- it was Labor Day, and a county fair was being held in a little town called Marvell, Arkansas. We had originally thought we were just driving 45 minutes to do this, but ended up driving 2 hours to this dot on the map. But the memories and laughs that I stored up that afternoon/evening were worth it. We did in fact judge a teen beauty pageant- something I had absolutely no idea how to do or experience with. Jill, her husband Warren and I were the VIP's at this little county fair and stuck out like tourists. We went through interviews, swimsuits, sport attire, and evening gowns with these girls. And then we crowned Miss Tri-county. It was really nerve wracking judging these girls...but fun:) It was a bit hot- I think the heat index was 115. I didn't feel so beautiful after the beauty pageant. However, when the pageant was over our night in the country wouldn't have been complete without a viewing of what the locals simply referred to as "the derby". We watched as grown men drove their souped-up cars into one another until they either caught on fire, totalled, or surrendered. Words really don't do this justice so I will leave it at that. We took a lot of pics and video to show Brad so he would believe all of our tales:) A night I will probably never forget:)

A great birthday. And not a picture taken. I'm totally ok with that:)