Since you are all my super best friends, I will let you in on a secret.  On Monday, it’s my birthday.  My 30^th birthday.  There, I said it.  This will be the first birthday I am having that I would prefer not to acknowledge as I will no longer get to say I am in my 20s.  While I am sad about this fact, I also feel a sense of calm about it as my 29^th year was a particularly eventful one and I am proud of myself for getting through it with some small amount of grace.  Normally, I am a very private person.  For this reason, along with the fact that my day to day life is generally pretty boring, I don’t usually share a lot of very personal information.  But, due to the fact that it is almost my birthday, I will indulge myself today by sharing some things that I would not usually discuss here.

Undoubtedly the biggest change in my life this year was the ending of an important and special relationship.  Although I won’t go into details, I will say that this in turn led to the loss of a best friend and huge differences in the way I live my life.  To say that this was a stressful turn of events would be a massive understatement.  There were many days when it would sit heavy on my chest in a way that would leave me short of breath.  In the end, it has allowed me to cultivate a greater feeling of peace in my life that I didn’t realize was such a priority for me until this year.

Other acknowledgements and accomplishments include:

1)    Colleenie getting married.  Which changed my life since she is like an extension of myself and it meant big changes for her.  It also meant that…

2)    My family threw a wedding.  Holy fun and stress.  Planning and throwing a wedding is maybe the craziest thing I have been a part of in my whole life.  I guess that is just if you do it Colleen and Megan style and insist on doing everything yourself.

3)    I quit biting my nails.  For real!  I have long nails now.  This is something I always said I would quit doing before I turned 30 and I did it.

4)    Becoming an auntie.  No, Colleen did not have a baby, but one of my best friends did and it was a very special event.

5)    I have always been a pretty tough cookie and felt fairly confident that I could handle almost anything that the world wanted to throw at me.  But this year in particular, I have continued to learn more about who I am and what is important to me.  Because of this, I feel much stronger physically and mentally than I ever have before.

6)    Realizing that it is perfectly okay to let myself be vulnerable.  I have decided that by allowing yourself to be vulnerable, it also means that you are being brave.  Which leads to…

7)    Starting Two Delighted with Colleen.  Blogging can sometimes be a little scary because it means putting yourself out into the world in a pretty big way.  This is a new experience for me because as I mentioned earlier, I am a very private person.  For example, after I publish this post, I will probably feel a little sick to my stomach because it is very personal to me and I have released it into the world.  But honestly, starting Two Delighted has led me to feel more balanced and fulfilled than I ever have before.  So I wanted to thank you all again for stopping by from time to time.  It really means the world to us.

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And for those of you mid to late 20s people that are feeling smug that you are not yet 30, I want to inform you that the time between then and now passes in the blink of an eye, so make sure to use it wisely.

Happy Friday!!