I'm 30!!!

I turned 30 yesterday! Wow, my 20's are over. I had an amazing birthday, thanks to friends but mostly, my sweet James. Sat. morning he took us to Smitty's for breakfast and then we WERE going to go for a drive, but had to return home first for "an oil change." He sent me inside to get him a glass of water to take with his DayQuil, and OH MY GOODNESS! A SURPRISE PARTY WAS IN MY HOUSE! I walked into decorations and a room full of our church friends and neighbors including Carlos, Claudia and family, Sarah, Tim and family and Mike and Luz and family. There were sandwiches, Mexican food, a cake and a lot of fun. James got me a fantastic new coffee brewer! I was SO suprised, in fact, more surprised than I have ever, ever been, and I had no make-up on to prove it! The next day, Sunday, he took us out to McMennamin's. Yesterday he served me breakfast in bed with a rose, a coffee and a choco-covered donut, we took Wendy to Kid's Club to play and then Colleen watched the Woo Loo while James and I returned to the Portland City Grill (where he took me for our anniv. last month) and we ate and ate and enjoyed ourselves! We walked to the mall, in downtown Portland, and I got a Moonstruck latte and chocolate. Yes, I am 30 now. What do I intend to do with myself this new decade? Plenty! I'm gonna start by losing weight. Tomorrow I go on the Atkins diet. Then, I'm gonna try to become wiser. Yeah, we'll see how that goes. I'm going to try to be more careful with what I say, and to say it with as much humility, love, good will and winsomeness as is humanly possible, which is tricky for me. I will pray more, and hopefully that will make my words and actions more effective. That's the biggest goal that I have. And I'm going to try and do my part to help protect the Christian values our country fought and died for in eras past by speaking out. The problem with the USA today, as my grandmother articulated so well, is that Christians no longer speak out. If pastors spoke out against anti-Christian "changes," more Christians would know what to do. Silence invites trouble, as does an idle mind and a guard, down. When we visit my family in Houston for the holidays, James and I intend to leave Wendy with my mom on perhaps 2 occasions so that we may have lunch with my grandmother at University Place and just soak up as much of her wisdom as we can in that amount of time. She's quite elderly but is still so sharp, and she is a blessing to this world. I want to glean as much of her insight as I can this season. Lastly, there is a surprise project that may take a decade, so I hope to be afforded the time and energy to take it on during the coming 10 years. So, those are some goals that I have, and perhaps the 30's really and truly will be the best yet! Here are some photos from "my birthday weekend!"