One of the best on record...

I am not really sure how it happened.  It's not like 29 is some impressive or momentous age to turn.  But I had the best birthday.  I think I can honestly say it is the best birthday I have celebrated in the past decade.  It was so good I don't think I can claim I'm not a "birthday" person 'cause I kinda want every year to go exactly like this one.

Let's start from the beginning.  My birthday was on a Thursday this year which means there was still school and other stuff going on.  So I woke up, started getting breakfast ready and gathering kids.  Jon took over and sent me upstairs to take a shower.  Little did I know he had taken out the water saver feature from the shower so I got the best high pressure water dousing shower ever known in the history of that shower.  It was heavenly.

Jon then informed me that we needed to be gone about 11 a.m. for my combined birthday/Christmas present (every December birthday child's nightmare...) so we hopped in the car and drove.  And drove and drove and drove.  I guessed the whole way there just to be amusing/annoying.  "Yay!  ChuckECheese, how did you know?  Laser Tag... awesome."  I was definitely not expecting to pull into the parking lot of Lasik Eye Center.  Jon had scheduled me an appointment to see if I was a candidate, and if I was I was going to have 'bionic eyes' before Christmas.

Oh.  My. Goodness.

I was exuberantly happy walking into the building, had a great appointment, passed every test and scheduled the procedure for the next week.  So awesome.

We headed from there to Scarlet's school where she gave her presentation on Bottlenose Dolphins (more on that later).

Later that evening, Jon got a babysitter and took me out to dinner at Firefly, a tapas restaurant my friend recommended.  Our choices were exceptionally delicious and it was a rare but enjoyable treat to be out to dinner with just my husband.

I had sweet friends give me little presents all day long that just perked up my day even more.  One friend gave me some chocolate covered pretzels, another gave me some grey nail polish I have been wanting forever, and another gave me a new cookie scoop!  My last one busted and I have been severely cookie hindered without it.

And even after that much good time, the best part still hadn't happened yet.  I had been trying for weeks to get a girls karaoke night together and the night of my birthday just happened to be the best date for everyone.  Even though I had a few people say they were going to come, I knew it was going to be late and I kinda thought everyone would back out on me that day.  And a few people did, but at 9:30 p.m about 12 ladies showed up on my door ready for a night on the town.

After some cake, we headed out to Hot Shots, a bar down the street that was almost completely empty until we came to shake things up.

It was SUCH a blast.  There were so many awesome moment, great conversations, amazing performances, it was just perfect.  I think my three favorite routines of the night were as follows:

3:  Adrianne's looks-so-good-it-could-have-been-choreographed number to Genie in a Bottle.  I am not exaggerating, the girl's got moves.

2: Anya's could-have-been-legit-it-was-so-good performance to Objection Tango.  Anya has a rockin' singing voice, as proved by a recent Sacrament meeting performance.  I was a little worried she would go all boring karaoke with some impressive ballad.  But no, my adorable Russian friend busts out some Shakira and it was amazing.

1: Our group number, Man I Feel Like a Woman.  It was legendary.

Honorable mention goes to my Tik Tok performance.  The bar was smoky and I was still getting over a cough so the vocal cords weren't at full capacity.  Solution?  Some good ol' fashioned talk-singing Ke$ha style.  And the duo stylings of Mindy and Shauntelle will be forever ingrained in my mind... and ears.  Not to mention my small and adorable Peruvian friend Sara taking on some Britney Spears.  Seriously ladies, it was all beyond awesome.

I finally climbed into bed at 2 a.m. It was a day/night not soon to be forgotten.  Thank you to everyone who joined me/contributed to the awesomeness.  Singing only to the five lonely people at the bar and the ridiculously busty bartender just wouldn't have been the same.