I am golden

I fell out of love with blogging recently. It is hard to blog when life seems pretty mundane; and, oh, has 2014 been mundane.

Thankfully, autumn came! I love autumn. Autumn is the world catching on fire. Autumn is delicious smells. Autumn is one more magical adventure before the world grows cold. Autumn is a different, special season. Autumn, when the trees seem tired of holding their weight in leaves and it is time for them to rest, but before they do there is lingering color. Color that stands as one last reminder of sunny days and lemonade stands and bike rides and road trips.

And do you know what happens right around the autumnal equinox?  MY BIRTHDAY! I’ve already mentioned how excited I was for this birthday, but I’m going to say it again. This year was my golden birthday! If golden birthdays aren’t already the coolest thing ever, how about having a golden birthday during the golden season? That is my life!

I was surrounded by gold the entire day: golden headband, golden streamers, golden friends, golden gifts, gold, gold, gold. It was perfect and I laughed and sang and enjoyed every minute of it.

Then, I went home to Florida. My family went above and beyond this year. My roommate, Julie and I got in on a late flight and after climbing into the back seat of my mom’s car I found a gold basket. They had gathered all the goldest foods they could find. I had Haribo gummy bears (which a. are my most favorite candy and b. come in a golden package), golden wafers, and every gold wrapped hershey product you can think of.

 It is hard for me to be around my family and not be full of joy and energy. After getting home I didn’t want to go to bed. I wanted to keep talking and laughing and soaking in every minute I could with these humans who remind me that I’m good and that life is good. Eventually, I decided to put my suitcase away. When I walked in the room I found exactly 25 blue balloons attached to gold envelops. My sister had contacted 25 of my favorite family and friends from every part of my life and they each wrote me a letter or a memory.

Let me just take a moment to thank each of you who wrote a letter, those of you who texted, those who called, those who facebooked, and all of you who reached out to me in a variety of ways on my birthday and throughout the year. 24 was a doozy and it was incredible to be reminded that I am surrounded by love and beauty and kindness and good examples and light. Thank you for being so unbelievably wonderful to me. Thank you for thinking of me. Thank you for caring. Thank you for expressing it. Thank you a million times over for being a part of my life and for letting me be a small piece of yours.

Anyway, after I let the mixture of tired, incandescently happy, and emotional run it’s course we did the only thing that made sense…we had a photo shoot.

The rest of the weekend called for air boating (thanks Bo!), Brazilian food, and catching up with all the people I like best in this world. A huge shout out to Blake for all of these pictures!

    

Singing 'Happy Birthday' was probably my favorite. We already have three songs that we sing to the birthday person, but add flaming sparkler candles and balloons that kept hitting us in the back of the head and it was a party. I ended up laugh-singing along too. I was also slightly terrified that My or Annalee's hair would catch fire.

A brownie cake full of gold sprinkles! This is the peak of birthday joy!

I've got that beard look on lock!

I've decided to fill my 25th year with golden moments. Here's to being a quarter of a century old!

Cool is in my genes