Lets just say I finally recovered...

Ok so I am officially 8,775 days old.  And yes I remembered to count leap years, and I almost forgot to not forget to not include 2000 until my mother corrected me.  Because there's that weird thing like "Every blah blah blah years there's not gonna be a leap year, but every blah blah blah years there is.  Or something.  So yes, 8,775 days it is.  I have a weird thing about time...I always like to calculate it differently than normal.  Anyway, now that I figured out I'm over 8,000 days old, I think I want to have a 10,000-day party.  I mean, it’s in like 3 and a half years, but if I remember…I will.

And there’s no time like now to write about turning older.  Unless I want to wait till 8778 which is just so even looking…NO!  Libby STOP!  You have put this off long enough!

Ok, so my birthday weekend began on Friday, when these lovely ladies (plus two gents) and I…

Went salsa dancing!  We had a blast!  I like salsa dancing, because when guys come up to you and ask you dance, they (get this!) actually want to DANCE!  What?  I know!!!  Although I've learned a few steps in my time, I was nothing compared to some of the girls being whipped around the floor.  Even if a heel or two became lodged into my calf at various points during the night...

Then on Saturday I headed into Amsterdam for a night of fun with Lily.  Remember how I showed you a picture of me holding a margarita?  Well that was after an extensive search for authentic Mexican food including phone calls, review research, and a glass of wine (always required when the search is labeled “extensive.”)  But I’m pleased to say we found it!  When we arrived, we started with this…

But the dinner ended with this…

See how shiny my face is?  Dinner also included chicken enchiladas verde (my favorite, although they were nothing compared to Mi Casa,) guacamole, and a quick lesson in history…

Apparently, (but this is just according to lily, the one who studied art history,) Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, Van Gogh, and Rembrant did not all hang out near the Mexican Pyramids drinking Heineken, and doing body shots.  And here I thought this was an authentic Mexican restaurant.  Sigh.

Well, we had told ourselves that our night would include some wine at home, a nice dinner out, and a lovely night sitting on the couch watching Arrested Development.  But after the above…well we very well could not go home could we?  NO!  So we headed to Coco’s the place where we spent New Years and danced the night away.  Well not really the night…more like 1:00.  We had started early…

The next day was free train travel day!  We felt like being tourist-y so I got my first Starbucks since being here...

Then Lily and I headed to Haarlem, where unfortunately everything was closed because it was Sunday.  That didn’t stop us however from enjoying the square…

Or the amazing church (which we couldn't figure out how to get into)...

Or statues of the man who apparently invented the printing press 12 years before it was actually invented…

Once back in Amsterdam, we headed for food.  (Oh pumpkin ravioli, I love you.)  We needed something in our stomachs so that we could eat pie.  Because Sunday was March 14th…as in 3.14 as in Pi!  So we celebrated…

The next day, on my actual birthday, I entered the main house to find streamers everywhere, a nice breakfast on the table, and a smiling family.  I cried.  As did Suzan.  We cry a lot around each other.  Rogier doesn't get it.  The day itself was fairly uneventful.  Fien took an extra long nap, probably from her sugar crash after eating part of the present she got me…

That night, we went to this adorable little restaurant called Hansel and Gretel (decorated in the fairy tale theme of course) where we had pannekoken.  I got ham and pineapple...mmm!  And of course Fien got poffertjes...Lekker!!!

I also enjoyed logging on to facebook all day and finding all my birthday wishes.  Especially the ones in Dutch!  And the evening ended with a wonderful chat for the first time with Pat back home.

All in all, it was a wonderful weekend, and a perfect way to celebrate my last year before being in my…GASP CHOKE COUGH…mid twenties.

Word of the day: vierentwintig – twenty four (literally, four and twenty)