32

I turned 32 yesterday and celebrated in the very low-key style that accompanies birthdays with newborns. It was so low-key that I actually FORGOT my birthday was coming up until I looked on the calendar that we keep on the side of the fridge and saw that it was written on there. Oops!

Our new little family celebrated with dinner at The Olive Garden, thanks to some gift certificates from my dad. And while it couldn't be more of a cliche, getting out of the house, wearing real clothes, and sharing a glass of wine alone with my husband and new baby was a gift in and of itself. It felt nice to celebrate the fact that there are three of us now and not two.

My sweet husband did not see 32 as a low-key birthday and celebrated with a diamond necklace as a combination Happy Birthday & Thanks For Having My Baby gift. There were also three bags of candy surrounding the jewelry box which is a remarkable indicator of how well he knows me. Diamonds are amazing... but so are Sour Watermelons.

I was thinking yesterday that a year ago I talked about a promise I made to myself to do one thing over the coming year to move myself towards getting back to ME and to my passions and creativity and all of the wonderful things that had to take a back burner for a while. As it turns out, it's good I set the bar low since ONE THING (reading a business book) is all I accomplished. However, when I wrote the promise, I was under the impression that we were about the move to Tennessee and settle down, not that the market was going to crash, a job was going to be rescinded, and that we would be altering our plans all together.

It took a full year to recover from that little curve ball and find a job in our new city, but we're here, our baby is with us, graduate school has started, and we're both feeling the beginning twinges of being settled for the first time in years. I know another couple who have been walking a remarkably similar path these last few years and they, too, are finally settling in. It's maddening that it can take so long and it's not something that everyone goes through so you can't really explain it unless you've gone through it, but (unfortunately) it's also not something you can force. You sort of just have to ride the wave until it plops you on the shore.

So our boat is docked for a while and we couldn't be more pleased about it. B is loving his job and his classes, and I'm feeling like we're finally in a place in our lives where there is room for what I need. And I won't give you a number of how many steps I'm going to take over the coming year to get back to my business, but I'm betting it will be far more than one.