The Wild Wild Wests: 22.... it must be my lucky year!

So, all through my sports playing career I have been #22. When I was like 10 I picked that number because my Dad's number in high school was 21 and my Mom's number was 23... so I fit right in between! :) During the phone call with my Dad on my birthday on September 7th he said that this year I don't need to wear the number on my back because I'm 22 all year round! :)

This was taken in Sweden 2006.

Well, my lucky 22 birthday was absolutely wonderful! I got my first birthday present at the end of June from my parents! I had mentioned that it would be nice to have a bike to ride to campus and so when they were up here to drop Kyle off at the MTC we went and got a bike! It's green and silver and according to my dad, "a granny bike" - said with no bad connotation at all! :) Since we got it, I got a basket and cute bag that goes in it. I absolutely LOVE my bike! I've ridden it so much - it's so nice to be able to ride it to school or wherever when Heath has the truck. I ride it to go to the grocery store, the post office, to ride with the cute kids on my street, but mostly to school. Thanks Mom and Dad!!

(Picture of bike coming...)

Then, the few weeks leading up to my birthday, my hubby got me some presents too - things that I've wanted: make up, a super cute watch, and the "Ticket to Ride" game - we love it!

Then, the night before my birthday I got home from work and Heath had gone across the street to play basketball at the church. I walked in and the reading light was turned on pointing to the table in our living room, I realized that was for a specific reason... this is what was on the table:

It told me that I needed to relax on my "birthday eve" so I did. I ate the yummy popcorn, drank the water, and used the remote there to turn on the movie - which turned out to be "27 dresses." I hadn't seen that movie all the way through yet and I discovered I love it! :) He's so sweet! He was home soon, he didn't play long, and he watched it with me while working on the pickles. He's so cute!

My birthday was on a Wednesday - the day I only have one class. I was going to go but Heath had work off and he asked if I could miss it, that I shouldn't have to go to class on my birthday. :) It's a class I can miss and I hadn't ever yet so I decided to miss it. The morning of my birthday I woke up next to Heath - with his adorable smile - telling me Happy Birthday. He got up and wouldn’t let me get up so he could bring me a lovely cereal breakfast in bed – so sweet! While I got ready and got birthday phone calls from Mom and Dad, Heath straightened up the house for us. Once we were both ready we headed out somewhere… where? I didn’t know, I told Heath to surprise me. I really had no idea! On our drive there I got a birthday call from Shelbs and talked to her for a while (man I miss being around that girl!) That was great! And we saw two cars with Happy B-day written on them (Heath said he wrote those on there for me.) After a while we were in Sandy at the aquarium! I had forgotten we had seen a sign for it a while a go – I was super excited!

We spent several hours at the aquarium looking at each exhibit closely. We learned some very interesting things about water and sea animals. We had fun making jokes and watching the different animals. We also watched and/or took part in all the feedings during the day. The first one was the feeding of the crocodiles. They are smaller ones but look just as scary. I definitely wouldn’t want to come face to face with one of those. Crazy! But the feeding was interesting to watch. They held the food out on a long pole and man those crocs just snapped and ate them right up. They also fed the big fish in the tank over and they went crazy! That was fun.

Octopus! Crazy!

My little fishy

Then we went over and took part in the sting ray feeding. Heath went first while I took pictures of him. He was much braver then I. He stuck his hand right down there and let that sting ray come right over his hand. He felt his little teeth scratch his knuckle but that was all. Then it was my turn. I wasn’t afraid of them, promise! I knew they couldn’t hurt me but every time I put my hand down there and the sting ray would come by and touch my hand I’d jerk it back out of the water. Twice it happened. So I didn’t quite get the full affect of the feeding but I pretty much did. It was pretty entertaining at least. We went to wash our hands so they didn’t smell of fish and had some nachos and a chili dog to hold us over until dinner.

Soon after that it was time for the penguin feeding! We had passed by the penguins a few times earlier that day but we hadn’t stopped to look because it was in between the other feedings and we needed to wait until we had time to really stand and watch them. Heath was SO excited about the penguins! I was too though – actually. They were so so cute and so active! I think we could have stood there and watched them all day but after a little while when the feeding was done we moved on.

We looked around at the gift shop some and then looked at the last exhibit – the “super hero" animals. They were ones that could do crazy things. There were some cool animals in there! It was a cute exhibit too. One of the animals in there was cockroaches. I don’t even remember what it was that they said was cool about them but I couldn’t even touch the glass I don’t like them so much! Yuck! Heath forced my hand to touch the glass he said wasn’t there… oh that would’ve been awful… and I made it through alive. It was close but I made it! After we went through that we decided to head out! Oh my goodness it was such a fun day there!! It was kind of funny because it was mostly moms with small kids there today but we had a fun date day in the middle of the week! I love doing things with Heath – just being with him is a great day! Man I love that man!

We had time between the aquarium and dinner later so Heath was just looking for somewhere else we could go while I was talking to Grandma and Grandpa Harrison who called for my birthday. Grandpa sang to me and then I talked to Grandma for a while about all the things going on. That was fun. I got off the phone as we pulled into Thanksgiving Point. Heath said he just wanted to see what was in here. I’d only been there for special occasions or holidays – a homecoming dance, Halloween, and Christmas. We went and walked around for a while. We first went into the store there that has some crafty looking home décor and stuff. It was fun. Every time we’re in somewhere like that we talk about the things we want or would love in our future home. I need to start writing those down so we remember the brilliant ideas we have. Heath also found a baby names book so we started looking through that. We’ve had that conversation several times too. He still wants to name our kids Gunther and Gertrude – but I’m fighting against those. :) We saw one in there that we like and that was really unique – oh, now I don’t remember it. I’ll have to ask Heath. After that we went over to the barns. One was closed and the other was like $10 or something to go into. Ah – no thank you. Heath was making comments about paying that much to see animals he grew up around. He told me when we have kids, I need to help him remember that they’ll be excited about things like that – especially if we don’t have a horse or any animals like that. He thinks it’s silly because he’s a farm boy – but I told him I’ll help him remember how city kids get excited about things like that. We went across the street to a glass place. They had glass blowing there but they weren’t working at the time. So we just looked at the many, many, many bowls they had hung up and all the other stained glass, vases, etc. that were there. It was a pretty cool little place.

We left Thanksgiving Point and headed home for a little bit before going to dinner. Mom had been texting and calling Heath about something she got me. They’d already gotten me a bike so they weren’t supposed to get me anything else but she had talked to Heath about someone dropping it off… I had no idea what it was! When we got home we checked with the guys upstairs to see if it had been dropped off there but it hadn’t. We went in and I was anxious to find out what it was! I went in to iron a shirt for Heath that night and I heard a knock at the door and Heath answered it and took whatever it was. When I finished ironing I went out to an edible arrangement with a “Happy Birthday” balloon attached to it. It was so cute and looked so yummy! Heath told me that my mom said they were talking about when all I wanted for my birthday was cantaloupe. Ha. I didn’t remember that but when I talked to Mom and Dad later they said it was when I was really little (Dad even thought maybe the year I was sick-when I was 3) but that’s all I wanted. It sounded yummy I guess. Fun memories. It was very yummy – I had some over the next few days!

Handsome man ready for dinner! :)

Yummy!

Soon Kesler and Jane were over so that we could go together to dinner. Jane made a beautiful strawberry topped cake for me – so cute. We went to Olive Garden for dinner.. yum! They are not ones that celebrate birthdays really anymore I guess so at the end a few servers just came over and sang the typical Happy Birthday song and then I got a TON of mints. Perfect present. We came home after and I opened presents from Heath. He wasn’t supposed to get me anything else but he spoils me! He got me some dressy brown shoes (I had actually gone and tried them on but didn’t know he’d gotten them) and a really really cute hat! I need to remember to wear it – I really like it!! Then we played Ticket to Ride! I lost but it’s so fun! Jane and Kesler had played it before and liked it too so that was perfect. After we played we had some yummy cake and then they headed out. Wow – what a perfect day! It was spent getting texts from, calls from, and seeing some of my favorite people in the world! And the whole day was spent with the one I love the most. Heath is so sweet and made my day absolutely perfect!

The fabulous baker!

Having a little too much fun with the candles :)

Making a wish!

Sunday my birthday continued. Chad, Denise, JT, Sara, Logan, and Andrew all came over for dinner and cake. We made ham and cheesy potatoes (my favorite!), Sara brought a salad, and Denise brought a fruit salad. It was very yummy! The best part was the cake, I think. Mainly because my sweet husband made it! It was a yellow cake with yummy homemade vanilla icing. Heath even decorated it to say Happy Birthday Linlea 22 and it was green and pink. Oh how I love him. It was also fun to be surrounded by family. I miss my parents, Shelby, and my grandparents at home and Kyle out in PA but it’s fun to still be surrounded by family here. It was a great day and evening too! What a special way to celebrate being 22!