Significant birthdays

January saw us celebrate my 30th birthday and Finley's 1st birthday. :D

A couple of weeks after we got back from Europe, Janelle and Nicole organised a surprise 30th birthday party for me at Gerard and Janelle's house. Despite everyone's best efforts at being secretive, I DID know a party was in the works (although I didn't know exactly when or where until the last minute). We can blame that on Gmail's email preview function, and Ben leaving his email account open on our shared computer! ;)

On the days leading up to the party on Saturday, January 25th, Ben told me a few times that he needed to go and pick up some computer stuff from Gerard at a specific time on Saturday evening. Well, I knew this was some kind of party-related false pretence, so I made sure to ask him lots of curious questions about what exactly he was collecting, what he was going to use it for, etc. Hehehe! He had all the answers ready and reeled them off very smoothly!

Then, on Saturday afternoon, Janelle sent a seemingly spur-of-the-moment text asking whether Finley and I would like to go with Ben as well, and stay for dinner. I entertained the idea of telling Ben I didn't feel like going, but couldn't quite bring myself to do it. The joke was somewhat on me, though, as until that text I hadn't been sure whether the party would be at our house or elsewhere... so I'd spent the day sneakily cleaning up our house, while trying to hide from Ben that that was what I was doing! :D

Here I am upon our arrival at Janelle and Gerard's, walking into a room full of our friends yelling "SURPRISE!"...

After a few moments of taking it all in (because it's still a bit overwhelming even when you know it's going to happen!), I think it was Claire saying she wanted to show me the cake that was the reason for me going around a couple of corners into the dining room. At this point I really WAS surprised, as you can tell from my face in the photos below! Look who was hiding around the corner...

Yes, Roxy and Nathan had driven out from Calgary to join the party, and THAT I had no inkling of!! I had thought they were coming the following weekend for Finley's birthday, but in turned out that Roxy had been in on the plan all along and intending to come a week earlier than her discussions with me indicated. :)

The party was a lot of fun, with an "international travel" theme (note the flag banner in the last photo above). There were lots of exotic potluck dishes, and the organisers had even consulted with Roxy and Ben to put together a quiz for everyone to answer about my travel experiences... things like how many countries I've visited, what country would I never go to, etc! Nicole made a yummy Mexican-style birthday cake. It was a wonderful birthday party and I felt truly loved!

Scrummy potluck food

Carrie, Finley and Cadi

Roxy and Nathan stayed until Tuesday morning. Here are some photos we took on Sunday after the meeting...

That afternoon we dropped in at a low-key 1st birthday meetup with a few of the mums and babies from my online birth month group. Here's Finley with the three other January 2013 babies there...

Marley, Amelia, Brynn and Finley

That night, Roxy and Nathan cooked a scrumptious chicken casserole for dinner. It was so good that I've since made it three more times!

On Monday, we spent the day relaxing at home and getting ready for Finley's birthday dinner that night. This was a spontaneous plan due to Roxy and Nathan being with us (Finley's actual birthday was 3 days later). We enjoyed a yummy dinner of slow cooker pulled pork buns with coleslaw, and a chocolate moustache birthday cake. It was nothing elaborate, but it was exactly how we wanted to celebrate our darling little boy's 1st birthday!

Roxy getting attacked! ;)

Making music

Finley's birthday dinner

Moustache cake moustache ;)

Nose bite = a Finley kiss

 

"Oi, where's the rest?!"

Finley had one more birthday celebration yet to come... a combined birthday dinner with Cadi, Chloe, Carrie and their parents the following weekend! Cadi and Chloe had also turned 1 in January (Carrie's birthday was still a few months away). It was hosted by Tyson and Nicole, and Nicole made the most amazing Very Hungry Caterpillar cake. We had lots of fun playing with the babies (toddlers!), opening presents, eating delicious food, and getting smeared with green icing. :)

Dads and babies (our mums and babies snaps didn't turn out!)

So there it is... a birthday party for me, and three for Finley. ;) Happy birthday to us!!

Central Europe trip, Post 11: Prague again

The final 2 nights of our Europe trip - from Monday, January 6th, to Wednesday, January 8th, we spent back in Prague, where we had started our road trip 3.5 weeks earlier.

En route between Vienna and Prague on Monday, we spent a few hours in Brno, the second largest city in the Czech Republic. We ate kebabs for lunch, treated ourselves to some truffles from a chocolate shop, and wandered through a small fruit and veggie market. We also witnessed some kind of nativity parade! It was a fun little interlude.

Back in Prague, we checked in to the excellent Hotel 16 (note the mention in the link of where afternoon tea is served!). We'd chosen this hotel due to its walkable distance from Charles Bridge and its very high TripAdvisor rating accompanied by rave reviews citing superior customer service. We wanted somewhere a bit nice since the next day was my 30th birthday!

The rating (and raving) turned out to be well deserved, as it was certainly the most impressive service we've ever encountered in a hotel. It was only a small hotel too (at a guess, less than two dozen rooms). An example of the exemplary service is that, on our last day, we needed to leave extremely early for our flight... so they set up the breakfast buffet just for us at 3:30am!

On Tuesday, my birthday, we wandered through the streets and along the Vltava River until we reached Charles Bridge. This historic 15th century pedestrian bridge, adorned with gothic statues, is one of Prague's most famous attractions, but we had not seen it on our previous visits to Prague. It was time to rectify that situation with a leisurely stroll across the bridge, checking out the artists, buskers, vendors, statues, and city views as we went!

Charles Bridge

"Sailors" advertising river boat cruises

Entrance to the bridge

Buskers

Prague, as seen from Charles Bridge

Busker

The street at the far side of the bridge

Once we reached the other side, we wandered the cobbled streets for a while before choosing a restaurant for a mid-afternoon birthday lunch. Then we re-crossed the bridge and walked back to our hotel, where the task of packing for our early morning departure awaited us.

I'll leave you there, dear reader, with thoughts of picturesque cobbled bridges rather than tales of stressful airport rushes and 10 hour flights with a baby. :) It's now about 4 months since we got home, so I'm very glad to have finally finished blogging this! Thanks for joining us on our trip!