Lovely Birthday

I have a lovely birthday in Friday! I didn't have to work which was very nice but I did go to my Toast Master's meeting bright and early at 6:30 so I didn't get to sleep in! I was Toast Master (basically the leader of the meeting) for the first time in this club which was fun. The meeting evaluator said the meeting got off to a great start because of my Perky Personality! Didn't know I was "Perky" that early in the morning but I'll take it! Aside from all the well wishes that I got via e-mail and a few cards that came via the real mail I got a very nice "Princess" decal brought to me all the way from CA by some friends who just went to Disney! (long story but that is one of my nicknames) and a delightful Princess birthday card from a wonderful friend who knows me well! Nicki's mom gave me a couple of really nice scarves, peach with roses and light purple, and a really beautiful scarf ring with purple stones in it. Royal colors of course. ha, ha!!
I also got lovely flowers from a dear friend on the E. coast. Any birthday or day that includes surprise flowers is a good one!

My mom's gift was a day cruise to Victoria, B.C. for me and a friend which I went on on Weds. It was a wonderful day. The weather was fabulous, the sea smooth and the company wonderful! I went with a very good friend and her daughter, my god daughter, who is 2. She was very well behaved on the whole and we had a good time. She hadn't ever been there and I was there only once many years ago so we sort of had a plan but it was pretty loose. I some ideas of places to go and things to see and some maps but mainly we were set to play it by ear and go with whatever we wandered upon, which led us to some fun discoveries. We ended up visiting a really fun vegetarian resteraunt, walked in the Empress Hotel, checked out an art fair and probably my favorite part was the visit we paid to the Victoria Bug Zoo which I happened to find while we were stopped for a diaper change. While at the Bug Zoo we had the privilage of seeing such sights as foot long Walking sticks like this one
In one room they have a big glass tank that is holding leafy branches and there is a tube that goes out the side and leads to a maze of other tubes that stretch all around two sides of the room, connecting small plexiglass boxes that hold colonies of leaf cutter ants and their different rooms. It was positivly facinating. I also got to hold a tarantula and we saw a facinating host of other huge bugs, many of which I would not want to meet outside of their glass tanks!

While we were in Victoria we also happened to notice these big huge bears along the in various places along the streets. They were all painted different and it turns out they were done to be auctioned off in Oct. as a fund raiser for the Lion's Childrens Fund and a few others charities. We had great fun wandering the streets with Teagan trying to find the next bear. I tried to post some pics of the bears and a couple of others tonight but for some reason blogger wasn't cooperating so those will have to come soon. At the very least you can see them at this web site, though they won't be as cute because they won't have Teagan hugging them and holding their hands! They are still pretty cool though and maybe later I will be able to post some of the ones I intened to put on tonight. On the ride home we briefly chatted with a sweet lady from TX and then about 1/2hr. later her husband came to our table with the souvenier photo that the cruise people had taken of us and asked us if we liked it. We weren't sure why he was asking but we laughed and said it was ok. He then told us he was buying it for us if we liked it. It was a totally unexpected gift from a total stranger and I still don't know why he did it. The lady on the boat gave me an extra comemorative cover so I could put Lissy's copy of the picture in it when I make her one so we will both have a wonderful memory of our day together. He didn't know it was my birthday cruise but I will always remember his kindness when I look at the picture. I think he probably bought it because Teagan was so well behaved all day and he thought it was deserved, mostly by her mother, but I'll never really know.

What I will remember most about my 28th birthday trip will be bugs and bears and the unexpected kindness of a stranger. And about the actual day, it will be lots of smiles, flowers and some unexpected wishes from some old friends and family that I hardly ever hear from.
I guess with that this Perky Princess needs to get to bed as we are heading to Seattle bright and early in the morning to go see the Dead Sea Scrolls at the science center and I need my beauty rest! :-)