B Turns 30!!!

Last Sunday, Dec. 12th, B turned 30!!  It's one of those birthday milestones which can be viewed as good and bad.  He was not looking forward to the day at all.  In fact most of our friends (outside of Michigan) have either turned 30 in 2010 or will turn 30 in 2011 and most all of us are viewing the same way...like it's a death march or something.  Honestly when I think about why it is so dreaded I can't logically come up with a valid reason.  All I can really say to justify it is that I remember when my mom turned 30, I was 9 years old and I remember thinking she was ancient.  Now that my mom is 50+ and I am approaching 30 it doesn't seem so old anymore but I guess the fear is that somewhere some 9 year old is thinking that I am now the ancient one.  I shudder at the thought.

But anyway, this post is about B and his birthday and not about my random ramblings about the animosity I feel towards a certain day which is still 9 months away (for me anyway).

One of the joys of having our new place is that it has so much more room.  In reality it is only about 600 sq ft larger but the fact that it is an open floor plan and the rooms are larger makes it seem so much more spacious.  And so I didn't fret when inviting 20+ friends and family members to come celebrate his birthday with us here.  The truth of the matter is that we invited far more than 20, but the bulk of the invitations went to family members which we knew, due to schedules and distance, wouldn't be able to make it.  We were originally expecting about 30 but some last minutes cancellations left us at 22 but that was more than enough!  It was pretty hard though because we would have loved to have invited more people but were uncertain of just how many people our place could hold comfortably.  I can now say that I definitely think we could potentially do 25-30 but more than 30 would be pushing it.  So we invited friends based on how many family members were going to attend and I think it worked out nicely.

Before the friends arrived we had B's birthday dinner which was of course pizza from his favorite pizzeria, Pizza Papalis.  If you live or are visiting the Detroit area it is a MUST have!  We had family visiting from Toronto and they have always heard us rave about it but had never tried it, and I don't think they were at all disappointed!  The only thing that was missing was the ambiance of eating at the actual restaurant, it is definitely part of the whole experience and it's best downtown when it is super busy.

At around 7pm we had friends start arriving, each of which was assigned to either bring something sweet or something savory/salty.  It was a Mexican theme and I myself made quesadillas, taquitos (store bought),  a con queso salsa, virgin Sangria, and brownies instead of birthday cake.  We also played some super fun games and spent a lot of time socializing.  It was really so much fun but I will say that I was extremely glad it was over!  Throwing a party can be really stressful.  I would love to say that I want to do it all over again in 9 months when I am turning 30 but I also realize that I will (if all continues to go well) have a newborn who could be anywhere between 2 weeks and 1 month old.  I'm not sure how much I'll feel like partying really...maybe a nice dinner or something.  Who knows, maybe we'll know more as the time gets closer!