26

 Yesterday was my 26th birthday.

When I was younger I had a little tradition going for myself. The night before my birthday, I would write myself a letter about what had been particularly good about the year I had just completed, and what I was looking forward to or hoping for in the year to come. I did this for a number of years. It's fun to look back on those letters. I didn't get around to doing it this year, though. Not really sure about last year.

my favourite people

So, to take the same angle of reflection, a lot has happened in this past year of my life. The most noteworthy, of course, being the birth of our Bronwen Elaine... I became a mother, Brian and I became parents. What a change and what a blessing.

I have learned that there are a lot of things that don't really matter. Well, I knew before that they didn't matter, but looking after this small baby has reaffirmed that to me. How clean the house is, if I managed to get done what I was planning that day, being a 'career woman' vs a stay at home mum (topic for a future post?), what other people think about parenting, if a baby uses a soother/dummy or not (Bronwen spits the thing out half the time anyway, so I guess she is making the decision for us!)... etc etc. There are so many little things in life that really don't matter. Even clothes. It sounds trivial, but I thought that I didn't care about buying clothes before... man, now I really am not interested. Which could set me up to be an unfashionable mother for the rest of my life, who has had the same shoes for the last 10 years. Oh well. At least my daughter looks cute! ;) (I am not frowning upon the buying of clothes! Just saying that I was one of those people pre-baby who wasn't really into it-- and now, I feel that the feeling has deepened...)

There is a verse somewhere in the Bible, after Jesus was born, where it says "But Mary stored up all these things and pondered them in her heart". I feel like that's what I have been doing lately. I just can't seem to articulate them, though. I have these moments of clarity, where I feel like I can really communicate what I am trying to get across, but then I lose them. Slowly, but surely I think it will all come out. I have been reading too many other blogs, and their words are often exactly what I was trying to say..

But, I can tell you about my birthday!

Last night Brian and I went on an absolutely lovely date. My birthday started out with a blizzard- a lot of snow fell overnight on St. John's, and continued on the morning of my birthday. But, that meant that the university was closed, and Brian spent the morning at home. We had delicious crepes and Kicking Horse coffee and it was lovely.

And then, the sun came out! Not a cloud in the blue sky.. our blizzard had dissipated into the expanse of the North Atlantic. So, we walked in to MUN so Brian could check something on the glider, which has just started  a 275 km mission in the waters of Fortune Bay. Unfortunately, there were some technical glitches, so we didn't get home until 5 pm.... and our reservation for the mystery restaurant which Brian was taking me to was for 6 pm. An hour, you say, that's plenty of time! Well, not quite as plentiful when there is a hungry and dirty-bummed girlie, and a drive to the babysitters. And to top it all off, a mountain of snow on the driveway including the dreaded crusty enormous snowbank at the end. From our friendly neighbourhood jumbo snow clearing front end loader- thank you, public works department...

However, with a good team you can accomplish anything. Brian shovelled while simultaneously analyzing the glider's problems, calling the restaurant to change our spot to 6 30, and admiring the sunset. I fed, changed, and  pumped more milk for Bronwen... at 6 we were in the car and driving- hurray!

Tonya, our good friend from church and also a certified baby whisperer, looked after Bronwen so we dropped her off and then headed downtown. To Bistro Sofia, a place we have admired and tried to go to twice for dessert (without a reservation, and they were always full). It was delicious! A cute little table by the window and a date with my love... doesn't get much better than that.

I had salmon.. one piece had a mango sauce, and the other a blueberry icewine glaze. With risotto and veges... delicious!

Brian had lamb shank with roasted potatoes and veges... also delicious (and a very manly big-boned piece of meat, haha, though the place was too nice to pick it up and gnaw on it ;)

They had an aamzing dessert case where you could pick your treat. Brian chose this yummy cheesecake.. 

and I had chocolate mousse!! So creamy and delicious...

We stopped at the liquor store on the way home to pick up a bottle of champagne (Yellowtail Bubbles.. not fancy but good... also, it is a resealable bottle for unpredictable babies!). And admired the $4700 bottle of wine in the 'wine vault' they have there... who buys those? I am curious! Picked up Bronwen and she was happy as a clam. Tonya even took a couple of family pictures...

it's hard to get a two month old to look at the camera for pics like this...  not the most flattering of Bronwen, but we all know she is cute anyway so it doesn't matter ;) see below

'I much prefer solo portraits'...

 Coming soon... a post on breastfeeding in public (because it is one of the realities of life with a hungry little baby!)