Happy BiRtHdAy to ME..

So today was my birthday and before I go any further I want to with my Grandpa Ekstrom and cousin Joey a Happy Birthday cause we share this special day. I love you guys. Thanks for being such great examples in my life and sharing our birthday with me.

Ok, so I turned 27 today. Yes I did just divulge my age on the internet. However I don't care about how old I am I just want to talk about how old I feel. We had a BBQ with my brothers and all of the family that could come and it was generally a pretty great birthday as birthdays go. As today ended I started thinking about the last 7 years of my life. Since my 2oth birthday there have been some big defining moments in my life and I wondered if I had really noticed them or just gone right over them because I was distracted by something else.

When I was 20 I got married, about 7 weeks before my 21st birthday, along with that wedding I became a mother to a very great little kid. I am not sure I was ready for all of it but I did it with faith that my father in heaven knew that I could handle it.

Before my 23rd birthday that marriage came to an end. A very abrupt and hard ending as well. I lost everything that I had thought would last for eternity. I even lost a few people that I never thought I would miss if they were gone. I miss my ex-in-laws and my step son, it was a hard transition to make.

Just after the divorce but still before the 23rd birthday I moved to Boise, I needed a fresh start. It was the first time that I had been more than a 30 minute drive from my parents in my entire life. It was a big, hard, but much needed change. I needed to find my independance and that is what I did.

For the next few years I worked hard and played hard. I learned a lot about who I am and who I want to be. Also falling and stumbling along the way but always getting back and and pressing on in the hope that someday I will find what I am looking for. I made some great friends and had some great times. I thought I found love again but I was wrong, and it was just about then I realized that I could not find love again unless I learned to love myself. So I became single again, and I have stayed that way for about 2 years now. I am a strong independant woman who has learned to support herself, and is proud of who she has become.

And this year prior to my birthday, I moved back home to Idaho Falls. Not just home to the town but home to my parents house. I work in an industry that is really feeling the pinch with the economy the way that it is and it became to hard to make ends meet living in Boise. So here I am a strong independant woman, living down the hall from my parents. I am not ashamed to admit that this had to happen. Things are hard in the travel industry right now and I am just glad to have a job, so tomorrow I will get up and go to work and be glad that I have the chance to do that.

Here is to hoping that the next year brings big changes to my life, I don't care how they come but I am ready for them. I feel like I am ready for anything, after what I have been through in the last 7 years what can the next 12 months bring that could be harder? So here is to birthdays, and big changes. In 30 min it won't be my day anymore and I will have started the next year of my life.