You're 27? Holy, I thought you were only 22...!

I celebrated my 27th birthday this past Saturday and was fortunate enough to share my celebration with my great new friend, Kristen. Her birthday followed a few days later. The pictures posted above are just some pictures of the important people that shared it with me. We kicked off the "birthday weekend" (yes, I do not like to have just a day, I enjoy an entire weekend of festivities!) by going to the Mount Pleasant County Fair, which was an experience in itself. It was such a muggy evening, thanks for buckets of rainfall the day prior. Kristen loves crazy rides and I thought I did too until the 2nd ride. I started sweating profusly and felt my stomach bounce off my other 27 year old organs. So instead, I decided to take pictures and watched Kristen laugh like a little kid as she jumped from ride to ride. In addition to the rides, we enjoyed gigantic corndogs, homemade lemonade and nachos with jalopenos (yum!). About 1 hour into our time there, a raindrop soon turned into terenchal downpour, so our time at the fair was cut short (i didn't mind). I have never seen so many large belt buckles, startched Wrangler, taperd jeans, and cowboy boots in my life...I stuck out like a sore thumb with my flip flops, rolled jeans, and tank top in addition to my lack of accent.

On my actual birthday day, we went to Mardi Gras Seafood (see picture above) which is basically a hole in the wall that has "ok" seafood (yes, I"m a seafood snob, but the Texans think it is the best there is) and live music. I got a shout out from the band and even was sereneded with a beautiful birthday song. I was fortunate enough to meet Kristen's family and more of her friends. Her friends now only refer me as "Maine" or "Yankee girl;" therefore I only respond to those two nicknames . The rest of the evening was history...but as I enjoyed my evening and heard nostalgic songs such as "Pour some sugar on me" which reminded me of college freshman year, "Take me home tonight" which reminds me of Maine, and "Black" my favorite Pearl Jam song, I refleced back on my 26th year. It was pretty damn good! I ran my first 10K race, survived an amazing vacation in Key West with my best friend, took on a big career change, moved home to Maine for a month, which ended up being one of my best summers thus far, learned how to crochet, bought a new VW jetta (her name is Jackie), discovered my love for running and yoga, was blessed with a beautiful godson/nephew whom I love dearly, and lastly shared a memorable cross country trip with my little brother, while making some amazing new friends along the way!

I cannot wait to see all the adventures that the year 27 holds for me...you are only as old as you feel.