A very happy birthday!

I had such a wonderful 29th (gulp) birthday!  I heard from so many family members and old friends, and I was fortunate enough to spend the weekend with one of my dearest friends, Sarah and her beautiful baby, Ella.  I left work early on Friday and started the 5 hour drive to WV to visit Sarah, John and Ella and check out their brand new home.  The drive went relatively smoothly until the last 2.6 miles...  there was a fork in the road where I could have gone straight to a gravel road or veered left.  I should have veered left, but I stayed straight onto a gravel road, which became a dirt road, which became a nightmarish scene of a slipping and sliding Mazda 3 driven by a crazed city-slicker lunatic who was clearly out of her element and void of any cell reception (me).  I finally ended up down by the river where some fellows stared at me like I had just been dropped in front of them by a UFO.  There was one thing these dudes and I agreed on: I was not supposed to be there. 

So I turn my Mazda around and made the hair raising trek back up the dirt road, where I finally got enough signal to call Sarah.  She laughed and came and got me.  A few minutes later, I was in the driveway of a home that was straight out of my dreams.  It is the custom home she and her husband had built on family property.  It is stunning to say the least!  I had so much fun palling around with my old friend and falling in love with Ella.  She is one of those babies that make parenting look like the easiest thing on earth...my children will be nothing like her I'm sure.  Sarah drove me around on her four wheeler, showed me her new bow and arrow, and her dear target...I stayed on the patio and drank sangria.  If you would have told me ten years ago my prissy friend would be hunting in the woods of West Virginia, I would ask if she had been abducted or if DC had been taken over and we were all forced to "live off the land." Truth is, after seeing her beautiful home, the peace and quiet, and the amazing friends and family she has there, I know this life is perfect for her.