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On Sunday one of my dearest friends, Erica, and I celebrated our 30th birthdays together. Neither of us do much to celebrate our birthdays, but we decided that since this year was a milestone, we really needed to do something special. I’m so glad we celebrated together.
It was fun to plan for the celebration. I wanted to make us each a birthday crown, but I wasn’t sure if Erica would like the idea or not, would she think it was too cheesy? When I asked her about it a few weeks prior, she loved the idea. She’s great like that. Her guy joked that we needed to wear a crown for our 30th while we still could because when we turned 40 we would just be too old to wear them. 🙂
We had our party at Owen Rose Garden in Eugene. What a beautiful place. The weather couldn’t have been more beautiful and there were roses in bloom everywhere. We had a potluck and set up games to play. Erica is a beekeeper and made us the best birthday candles ever. I baked some carob cupcakes with coconut flour and Jeff came up with a delicious frosting for them. We brought cucumber salad for the potluck and still hardly put a dent in the cucumbers piling up in our fridge right now. (We need to have another party just to feed everybody the zucchini that’s currently taking over our house.)
The first pictures in this post were taken with my camera, by Jeff and I. All the pictures after the * were taken by my friend April, who is an amazing photographer. (For you locals looking for a photographer, she just started up her own business- Little Trees Photography.) Â It was such a delight to see the moments she captured that day and I’m so grateful to her for taking pictures there. We even got some rare family pictures, which was really a treat. And she captured Jeff throwing bean bags behind his back (he even got one in) and Bracken playing with her little cutie pie we adore.
As a sidenote: do you ever say something and then wonder why in the world you said that? On the way home from the party, I was chatting with friends and said the only way I can get myself to cry is if I watch a really sad movie. Hours before saying that I was tearing up because Bracken’s little friend thought he needed a gift too, not just me, and wrapped up some special rocks for him. It was so sweet I could hardly stand it. So, as you can see, it doesn’t take much to make me cry at all. Tears come to my eyes over the smallest things sometimes. What I meant to say is that if I need a really good cry, not just tearing up or dropping a few tears, a sad movie can do the trick. But I digress.
Erica has lots of family nearby and I missed my family especially at the party, it seemed to make me feel their absence more strongly. Only a few friends were able to make it to the party and even though I knew the day just didn’t work out for many people, I had the thought cross my mind- ‘I’m about to turn 30 and how many people do I have in my life who really care about me?!’ I know, a bit dramatic, maybe because 30 felt like a big deal. That thought gave me a moment of guilt that I was being ungrateful (and I almost didn’t write anything here, but always feel the need to be completely honest), but I truly felt thankful for the blessings of the day. When I really thought about it later, the day was absolutely wonderful the way it was because I was able to spend quality time with my friends that came and we had such a great time that day. I have memories I’ll always cherish from our celebration. My actual birthday isn’t until the 21st, so lucky me- I get to celebrate all month long! And I think Erica and I should definitely do this again for our 40th!
Happy Birthday Taryn~
Enjoy your trip to Colorado with your family and many blessings to on your birthday!
Happy birthday Taryn,best wishes to you!
Happy Birthday, Taryn! All the best wishes. The party looks so lovely and the pictures are great!
The birthday party looks like you all had fun, surrounded by such beauty and love.
I agree it is nice to see you in pictures seeing how you are always taking them.
Yes, I think we should celebrate our birthdays all month. I have finally realized I have been following 5 or 6 lady bloggers for several years, that I adore and all have birthdays in September. Mine was on the 7th. Hmmm..I find that kinda interesting. I was lucky enough to celebrate with a camping road trip with my daughter along the northern California coast and great yarn (and the food!) We are headed home soon to an overflowing garden, husband and son who have some kind of surprise waiting. But I think we will check out Sweet Creek Falls on the way. Oh man I love September. Wishing you and your family well.
Happy Birthday Taryn! I know how you feel about your family not being there. My family is in Germany and hubby’s is about 12 hours from us. Looks like you had a wonderful time though and I hope you get spoiled for the rest of the month. 🙂
Happiest of birthday’s Taryn, I celebrated my birthday on Sunday too.
I do understand about not having your family around and I’m sorry. I spent
my day at the beach with my husband which is exactly what I wanted.
Here it to another awesome year!
Your party looks like it was wonderful and I wish I could have been there! It was the only day we could get our group cider pressing coordinated with everyone being teachers around here and starting back up with school. I am going to try to stop by market this weekend and hope to see you then!
Hugs, Lara
Thanks Lara!! I understand and I hope you got a lot of apples pressed! I wan’t to be sure to give you a head’s up that we won’t be at market this weekend- we’ll be out of town, but we’ll be back at market the following weekend. Love to you!
wanted*
love the family shots esp, they are great and such precious and lovely photos to have to remember your 30th. i know what you mean about family, my 30th was spent in the UK, were i now live, but my family were all in NZ where i am from and its special occasions were that distance is so noticeable. I wish i had some magic teleporter!!!
Yay!!! I love the pics from your party – especially of you, since you’re usually the one behind the lens. I too, wish I could have been there to celebrate with you two. So glad you had a very special day together.
Happy Birthday……What a beautiful place you chose to celebrate at!
What a lovely post, so honest too. You are such a special person and you had your very dearest two people, Jeff and Bracken with you, sometimes it is easy to try to read into things too much, especially if we lack confidence. I sometimes have thoughts like that and wonder if people really do actually like me! a few loyal, true friends are more precious than lots of fickle ones.
I can’t believe how alike you and your friend are, I was scrolling quickly through the pictures to get to the words to find out if you were twins!! Take care x
absolutely adore *you*… it was supposed to say *you*…
sigh…
well, i can tell you that peter and i absolutely adore, and were so bummed to not be able to make it… 30 is a great milestone, and i would’ve loved to be able to celebrate it with you! it looks like it was a wonderful day, and we were definitely there in spirit… <3