I cannot express this joy

What do you say when words cannot express the joy that's in your heart? The thankfulness? The immense appreciation for love; for family; for friendship? How does someone even begin?...

This year, my birthday actually began the day prior. After writing class on the morning of the thirteenth, my friend-of-many-years, Josselyn, picked me up and took me out for lunch. Half the menu was vegan and contained items such as "vegan steak" and "non-dairy cheese"... aren't those oxymorons? Anyway, I had the most amazingly non-vegan turkey sandwich and I enjoyed my time out with a friend.

Later that evening, my poppop came over for a simple dinner and I opened my gifts from my family.

All of my gifts are so perfect. Mom and Dad gave me a wonderful forest green sweater that I had fallen in love with from a catalogue months ago, a bookish nightshirt, lip gloss, a Jane Austen knitting magazine, and an adorable picture book for me to keep for my own children one day.

Poppop gave me a lovely card inviting me out for an afternoon going out to lunch and shopping at a bookstore.

Theresa made me a Braille card with an elephant on it.

Curtis (with Connor's help) made me an incredible card with his and my faces put in place of Flynn Rider's and Rapunzel's from a picture from Tangled. To go along with it, he gave me the Tangled soundtrack. Love it!

And, last but not least, Connor gave me the Pirates of the Caribbean Curse of the Black Pearl soundtrack. But wait, you all need to hear the awesome story that goes along with this.

Connor handed me the card that he had made. It was amazing. Old, brown, crinkly paper with a picture of Captain Jack Sparrow on the front. Then I read his message (which was peppered with pirate talk, Bible verses, and brotherly love). After the main message of the card, he had written that I had an adventure to go on and I was to read the little scroll that was taped to the inside.

He had made me a treasure hunt! A hunt with clever and challenging clues and complete with a chest at the end with my gift inside.

Thank you, Connor. For being my brother, for being my friend, and for doing fabulous, crazy, and wonderful things for my birthday.

I woke early on the morning of my actual birthday. After my Bible reading and prayer time, I turned on my laptop. Immediately after opening my email and turning on Skype I was flooded with happy birthday messages. I was completely overwhelmed. I received some precious emails from old friends but the majority of my birthday wishes were from the friends that I had made through CollegePlus!. God has blessed me so richly and I don't know how on earth I deserve so much love. To everyone who either left a comment on my blog, sent me an email, posted on the CP! forums, sent me a private message, or Skype-messaged me; Thank you. Thank you all a hundred times over.

I had made plans with my life-long-friends Hannah and Emily to have breakfast with them at their family's coffee house on my birthday morning. Daddy was wonderful to drive me there on his way to work.

Everything was so lovely. These girls went to so much effort to make our breakfast extra special. Again I will say it; I am blessed! I am so very, very blessed!

Hannah gave me an adorable vase with sweet pink flowers (that smell amazing!) and both girls had remembered how much I had loved a dessert that they make; sour cream, with brown sugar and strawberries. Hannah loving pointed out that none of us needed to eat an entire cup of sour cream for breakfast, so they made it out of yogurt instead. It was wonderful. Yum.

Best cappuccinos ever. Period. No Discussion.

I still am in shock, but, through their gifts, these girls (and their family) were pretty much able to touch every aspect of my personality. Poet/writer? Check. India? Check. Organic? Check. Beach? Check. Hedgehogs? Check. These peoples are amazing. Plus, they write beautiful cards. Everyone should get some cards on their birthday that make them want to cry. These were those cards.

Thank you, girls! God has blessed me so richly with your friendship and I love you both more than words can say!

After sitting and chatting with Hannah and Emily for just about four hours, we walked home and said our goodbyes. Mama then took my siblings and me out to have lunch at Pinkberry. Afterwards, Connor was amazing and stayed home while Cora napped so just Mama and I could go out together. Since I am seventeen now, we went to the mall and Mama let me get some eyeshadow. I've been playing around with colors over the past couple days and I've found it to be challenging to get it just right, but it's been immensely fun.

When we arrived back home, I was able to have some down-time and cry over an email that a friend sent me. I did my best to reply to a few messages, but, if you sent me one and I haven't replied to it yet, don't worry. I'll get to it; I promise. 

In the evening, when Daddy got home from work, I went out to dinner with just him and Mama. It's never just the three of us and I had a positively lovely time. The restaurant that I picked is right above the Santa Monica Pier and is called the Lobster. The food is amazing. 

This is the same entree that I ordered for my birthday last year; Shellfish and Black Linguini Pasta. So amazing.

For dessert we had blackberry cobbler. Be still my heart.

We walked on 3rd Street Promenade after dinner. While looking in Anthropologie I fell in love with many things that I couldn't afford to purchase. Sadness.

*sigh* Even the sale section is expensive.

I did end up buying one thing, though. This mug. Mama spotted these adorable monogramed mugs and each letter of the alphabet was a different color combination. The one for the letter 'C' was dark green and black and I fell in love with it instantly. It is pretty, vintage, cozy, and it will hold well over twelve ounces of coffee or tea. Oh, yes. 

Even though it was late when we arrived back at home, it is a tradition for us to watch a movie that we haven't seen before on our birthdays. This year I was greatly torn between watching The Help or the third Pirates of the Caribbean. Connor convinced me that we can watch The Help later so I ended up deciding to watch At World's End. It was an awesome movie and the ending was beautiful and sweet and perfect (especially if you watch until after the end of the credits ;-) )

All in all, I had an absolutely, wonderfully beautiful birthday. Now I'm officially seventeen and I hope that pray that God allows me to continue to grow in Him and have another year just as amazing as sixteen was.