We're gonna party like it's 1999...or something like that.

It doesn't seem like all that long ago that a birthday meant I had an excuse to pull out a pair of heels and flat iron my hair. It meant vodka, lipstick and cover charges. My, my, my..how birthdays around here have changed. The mere mention of a birthday has me thinking of face painting and loot bags. We recently celebrated Owen's 4th birthday and we hosted his party at a play centre because we're not crazy enough to invite the kind of destruction that accompanies a herd of 4 year old's into our home. Don't get me wrong, each and every kid who joined us that day was a cutie patootie but they've got some serious energy to burn. By the time we schlepped our kids, gifts and leftover pizza home, Tim and I collapsed on the couch and moaned about how exhausted we were. It was 8:30pm. What the hell has happened to us? When we were dating in university, we were capable of rolling in at 3am and still getting up for class the next morning. Not so anymore, my friends.


Tim turned 31 today. We met when we were 21, so I've celebrated a decade's worth of birthdays with him. Some of those have been more low-key than others, but today's celebration was decidedly family friendly. We went to a museum, followed by a dinner at a family restaurant where Owen could get his face painted. We spent the day exploring dinosaur bones, taxidermied animals and gawking at a mummy. Leaving a trail of crushed cheerios and smeared banana everywhere we went, we snapped pictures of our kids enjoying the sights.


Simon finding Nemo
No more photos of us pounding back shots, no pics of us scarfing hotdogs at 2am, no pics of drunk friends laughing and stumbling home.

We rolled into our place at 7:30pm and began getting the kids ready for bed. Of course, Owen managed to rub his painted face into the carpet so I had to scrub it clean while he brushed his teeth. Facepaint in the carpet. One lost hat at the museum. Two shirts smeared in banana and pizza sauce. Two adults too tired to talk at the end of the day. One of them typing this blog post and the other playing Angry Birds. I wouldn't have it any other way. Happy Birthday, Tim.

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