I turn 24...

Birthdays are wonderful days. They hold so much anticipation, excitement and are so much fun. It is basically your personal Christmas! Every year I look forward to my birthday. I celebrate my half birthday in September, a tradition we started in college after an accidental late night out on a Monday, which happened to be my half birthday, we started with one drink...and ended up with a 6 am bedtime.

This year, my birthday is bittersweet. I am turning 24, sick. There is absolutely nothing exciting about this age. When you turn 21, you get to have your big 2-1 birthday at the bars with all of your friends. When you turn 22, it’s your last birthday in college and you're seniors. When you turn 23, it’s your first birthday as a grown up. It kind of stinks to work on your birthday, but it’s also really fun in my office because we make birthdays a really big deal. But when you turn 24…you realize, man, I have to work on my birthday almost every year, and it’s a constant reminder that you are further and further away from your glory days in college.

Luckily, I still pretend I am in college with my friends! We have themed bar crawls, still have fake birthdays at the bars, have the same pre-bar rituals of Lifetime movies, kitchen dance parties, doing our nails and getting ready together, all after we went shopping for our outfits for that night of course. This year, my birthday theme was neon.



Enough said.

Well, last weekend was my birthday celebration! I was so excited because one of my very, VERY best friends was coming into town for my special weekend! Bridget flew in from Chicago on Friday morning so I took the day off from work. After a car ride of singing and dancing to some of our favorite oldies, we headed to the Mall of America to hunt for the perfect neon birthday outfits.

…Bridget bought a black dress. My roommate wore a black dress…Our friend Amy wore a black dress…whatever!

Sadly, finding neon was a lot more difficult than we thought. And after four hours in the MOA (who does that??? You only really need 90 minutes tops), we were exhausted. We found our dresses in the last store, Urban Outfitters, and I got the world’s best and cutest birthday wedges from Nordstroms, broke the bank and budget a bit on these, but hey, they are multicolored and will match literally anything and everything I would wear! Plus, it’s my birthday!!



Apartment #11 girls are finally reunited again.



We have to do this picture at every reunion...



Girlfriends!



Love my Steveo.

The birthday party was FABULOUS! We had a little pregame at my house before we hit the bars, and what pregame is complete without some turquoise cupcakes made especially by Paige? Of course these cupcakes were funfetti, and of course they had leopard print cupcake tins, and of course we had pink napkins, PLUS “Keep Calm and Birthday On” napkins. Classic.

After many pictures, a few drinks and sweets, my lovely parents came to take us to the bars. We were READY! I had such a fun night and was so happy to be reunited with Bridget and my friends.

 

Mom and dad!

Girls at Drink in Uptown

Friday night left us pretty tired and with the realization that we are getting old. We spent our Saturday watching Lifetime movies in our pajamas and napping…juuuuust like college. Our nap time was certainly not as rejuvenating as we hoped…we didn’t even make it out for St. Patty’s day...


Breaking into my annual DARK double chocolate birthday cake made from scratch by dad!



Bridget left on Sunday morning. L I was so sad to see her go, but only five weeks to go until we are reunited again at our friend Andrew’s wedding!

Finally, it was my birthday week at work! I received a lovely surprise from my little brother, Kevin, such a sweet boy. Kevin had flowers delivered to my office, this was quite the surprise! I later got flowers delivered from Nic and a second (mistake) delivery of the same bouquet Kevin sent me earlier in the week...aka my cubicle looked like a scary flower shop.


Flowers from two of my three favorite men :)

 Much to my dismay, my coworkers found out about my deeply-rooted, childhood FEAR of ET. Yes, I am absolutely terrified of ET. I can honestly, and sadly, admit that even before my birthday this year, I still have been having ET nightmares. I am still that person who runs full-speed down the hallway with a major fear that ET is behind me or will pop out from around the corner. Damn the friendly aliens, right?! So when I came into work and saw how my cubicle was tastefully trashed and festively decorated, I noticed the multiple copies of ET pictures everywhere. Not only did they print out all of these pictures, but they photoshoped me into them! SCARY! Now I can admit, on my 24th birthday, I had nightmares about ET.


After some birthday decoration cleaning, this is what I was left with...



If this won't give you nightmares...I don't know what will...I was speechless.

My coworkers are amazing!! Even after all the decorations, taking me to lunch and cupcake presents, they had a special cake delivered to the office from "Queen of Cakes" in Edina. Sadly...this is how they view me...cupcake crazed :)

In the end, turning 24 wasn't that bad. I had an amazing girls dinner for my birthday with all of my closest friends, and new friends too! It was a blast! I am so touched to have such wonderful friends, some who drove almost 2 hours just for the dinner! I can't help but be excited for their birthdays now too!!