Birthday Wishes and Blessings

Happy Monday Friends!

I woke up feeling great.

So many blessings and reasons to be happy.

It feels so good to feel light, especially after feeling a bit blue lately.

I was discussing with a good group of girlfriends what a strange time in life this seems to be for so many of us.

And with that comes shifts in friendships, interests, goals, places in life.

But this morning I am giving it up to God and trusting that He will guide me.

I put in a prayer request with my friend Rachel.

Did you know she takes prayer requests and posts them every Monday morning?

This way ladies all over the country can join forces and say a prayer for you.

How cool is that?

But what other reasons besides prayer do I have to be happy you ask?

For starters it's my husband's birthday.

In our house that means the obligatory birthday balloon bouquet.

Peet's coffee for 2

And daddy taking the time before his workday starts to play Zingo with the kids

p.s. I'm the only one in the entire Howe family that CANNOT do the taco tongue.  I feel extremely left out.

Happy Birthday Art.  

You are amazing, you know that.

I love you.

In other news.

I woke up to discover I had won a giveaway from Mel!

I seriously never win anything, so it was a little shocking.

I had to keep going back and checking on the link to make sure I read it right.

I am going to pick out these little cuties for Syd, and of course order these for Tay

This week Heather is hosting the Blogger's Guide to Summer

Some of my very favorite bloggers are guest blogging over there all week long, and 2 giveaways a day.  

Hop on over and say "Hi" to Heather.  

You'll be glad you did!

And to wrap up one of the longest Monday posts ever, 

I just want to say thanks to my first ever mommy group.

 5 years ago this summer, I met an amazing group of women in a little class called Baby Dance

They were my first group of "mommy friends"

It was the first time I realized the difference between girlfriends, and girlfriends with kids.

There is a difference, I'm convinced of it.

I love these girls so much.

It was a perfect match-up from the get-go.

We all love to eat and cook.

So what was once playdates every Friday morning at Jackie's house,

is now a once a month day out eating at a new restaurant, or coooking up a feast at one of our homes.

The picture above is from fondue/shabu-shabu night at Jackie's.

These girls can all seriously cook and have the BEST taste in food.

Yesterday we met up at PJ's Abbey in Old Town Orange.

We ate, we drank mimosa's, we laughed, we talked.

Jodi C (there are actually 2 Jodi's in our group, how random is that?) has named us Brunch Bitches.

What can I say, she is Italian and from Chicago, and I love her.

After feasting we went antiquing and shopping through Old Town Orange.

We came upon Blessings, the cutest little shop,

and I picked up this sweet guy

It was a weekend, and is a day to count my blessings.

They are surrounding me every day.

Sometimes I just have to open up my eyes and realize what's right in front of me.

What are you feeling blessed about today?