{"id":4962,"date":"2014-09-14T20:55:24","date_gmt":"2014-09-15T02:55:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/?p=4962"},"modified":"2014-09-14T20:55:35","modified_gmt":"2014-09-15T02:55:35","slug":"growing-old-is-inevitable-growing-up-is-optional","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/growing-old-is-inevitable-growing-up-is-optional\/","title":{"rendered":"Growing Old is Inevitable, Growing Up is Optional"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today was (is) my birthday.\u00a0 Yep, I am growing older, which is inevitable for all of us. But, I have decided that growing up\u2026.well that is optional \ud83d\ude42\u00a0 \u2026<\/p>\n

For my birthday my kids and their friends are spending the weekend with my husband and I and nothing is better for making you feel younger than hanging out with a group of college age kids!\u00a0 We have had an absolute blast.\u00a0 On Saturday we went to a country western town with an awesome steakhouse.\u00a0 We decided take an old-fashioned western photo together to commemorate our exciting night out.<\/p>\n

\"rawhide<\/a><\/p>\n

Next we went to the western steakhouse where they had a live country band performing. The members of the band were far older than your typical band and that made it all the more fun.\u00a0 They were awesome and fun and they went out of their way to make the night special by singing songs dedicated to me throughout our night.\u00a0 We started with the appetizer of real rattlesnake!\u00a0 No joke. We thought we would be adventurous and try it out. All I can tell you is that it tastes like chicken and if you dip it in enough ranch then you don\u2019t taste it at all \ud83d\ude42 \u00a0This picture of me and my son eating it is our proof:<\/p>\n

\"dalton<\/a><\/p>\n

We country danced and had a great time laughing and telling stories and they even had a magician come to our table and do magic tricks for us.\u00a0 It was an awesome night and one I will remember for a very long time.<\/p>\n

\"rawhide\"<\/a>\"magician\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Then today we woke up and got ready for church and my two cute kids came to give me big hugs:<\/p>\n

\"amy<\/a><\/p>\n

Then after church we went to visit a gorgeous LDS temple to get a family photo together.\u00a0 I wanted a family photo taken there on my birthday because it is my reminder that the best birthday wish ever is to have our families together forever and I am so blessed to have the family that I do.\u00a0 Of course, it only took about five hundred tries to get my kids to both behave enough to get a semi-decent shot because they were so busy making faces and doing crazy poses.\u00a0 But we finally managed to get a few:<\/p>\n

\"family<\/a> \"family<\/a><\/p>\n

Next we came back to enjoy an amazing Italian meal together and during the dinner the kids went around the table and shared their favorite memory of me and what their favorite thing about me was. \u00a0Talk about getting all choked up! \u00a0They said the sweetest things and as they shared their favorite memories I realized that each of the things they shared were not about places we went or activities we were doing – it was about conversations we had had together – that was what they remembered as the most meaningful moments together. \u00a0What a lesson to all of us that we need to spend more time talking face to face and less time on our phones or being busy…meaningful conversations are the greatest memories of all. \u00a0That was a great revelation for me as I heard them share their memories of me. \u00a0What a great birthday gift that was from our kids.<\/p>\n

\"family<\/a><\/p>\n

Then finally tonight we changed into comfy clothes and\u00a0my cute husband surprised me with a birthday present of a massive diamond ring\u2026of course it is made of plastic \ud83d\ude09 and he was quick to point out that this fake one is FAR bigger than any real one he would actually buy for me, but it was his cute way of telling me that I get to pick out a ring of my choice with him as my birthday present.\u00a0 What a sweetheart and a total cutie…and not just because he understands my love of all things sparkly \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

\"amy<\/a><\/p>\n

I can\u2019t wait to grow old with that man\u2026okay, older\u2026ya, ya, I get it\u2026.I am already growing old with him.\u00a0 But for all of you out there growing old right along with me let\u2019s all just remember that growing old may be inevitable, but growing up is totally optional so let\u2019s ALWAYS stay young at heart!! \u00a0Thank you to everyone who made my birthday so special today with warm wishes, cards, emails, texts, facebook messages etc. You all made me feel so loved and that is the best birthday gift anyone could ask for \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

Have a great day tomorrow and STAY FOREVER YOUNG!<\/p>\n

~Amy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today was (is) my birthday.\u00a0 Yep, I am growing older, which is inevitable for all of us. But, I have decided that growing up\u2026.well that is optional \ud83d\ude42\u00a0 \u2026 For my birthday my kids and their friends are spending the weekend with my husband and I and nothing is better for making you feel younger […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1771,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1085,4954,4965,419,4955,4655,590,1431,4959,4958,1239,2715,1261,4960,4298,51,4956,189,132,4953,3764,4964,87,3084,35,596,161,2984,4966,4957,4961,4963,1506,4962,418],"class_list":["post-4962","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-adventure","tag-amys-birthday","tag-band","tag-birthday","tag-birthday-wishes","tag-blast","tag-celebrate","tag-celebration","tag-cell-phones","tag-conversations","tag-dancing","tag-dinner","tag-email","tag-face-to-face","tag-families-are-forever","tag-family","tag-fiesta","tag-friends","tag-fun","tag-growing-old","tag-growing-up","tag-italian","tag-laughter","tag-lds-temple","tag-love","tag-loved-ones","tag-party","tag-photo","tag-rattlesnake","tag-rawhide","tag-spending-time-together","tag-steakhouse","tag-temple","tag-western-town","tag-wish"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4962","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4962"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4962\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4980,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4962\/revisions\/4980"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}