My 25th Birthday!

 

Birthday week is over. I am now 25! Brett planned a few sweet surprise dates last week. On Wednesday we grabbed dinner and then headed to Cinepolis. Cinepolis is an awesome luxury theater. You get your own leather recliner and a waiter at the push of a button that will bring you all kinds of yummy things. On Thursday we went to Benihana for dinner and stuffed ourselves silly. If you don't already know, sign up for Benihana's E-Club. You get free dinner for your birthday! We spent a lot of time getting free birthday food last week. I didn't cook once!

Mmm! Green tea ice cream!

 

Saturday was my birthday. We woke up early and Brett said I needed to get dressed because we were leaving shortly. We got in the car where I was promptly blind folded. After parking, Brett said I could take off my blind fold. We were by the water and we were going whale watching! I squealed! I've been talking about wanting to go whale watching for years. We spent three hours seeing all kinds of whales and dolphins! I could not believe how many whales there are right off of our shores.

 

 Poor B feeling a little sea sick


 A momma and baby whale! You can see the momma's back on the left and the baby's spout on the right:)


After whale watching we headed home and I assumed we were done for the day (considering all of the date nights in the week prior and the perfect morning we had just had). As soon as we got upstairs B told me to fix my crazy wind blown hair because we were leaving AGAIN! We got in the car and I was blind folded. After a little drive we parked and he told me to keep the blind fold on. He led me and we walked. After stopping he told me to take off my blind fold and I was circled by family and friends yelling surprise! He and my parents had planned me a surprise party and I didn't have a clue!

The party was perfect in every way. The menu was themed around kid foods with a gourmet twist! Fancy macaroni and cheese and sliders with all kinds of yummy fancy toppings. My kind of food! I even received the most thoughtful gifts. The icing on the cake (punny) was when B announced that we all needed to come inside because he had a surprise for me. Another surprise?!

We all squeezed in to the living room and Brett clicked play. This was my surprise...

My 25th Birthday Gift From B from Heather Pepin on Vimeo.



How sweet is that video?! He put so much time and thought in to organizing and making it and so did all of the people involved. Best video ever!

I think my 25th birthday may be my most favorite birthday yet. I've celebrated 8 birthdays with Brett so I'm no stranger to incredible thoughtfulness and grand celebrations (that's how he does things) but this birthday felt extra special. I felt so unbelievably loved by those in my life! I'm starting this new year of my life very very thankful. I have an incredibly sweet and thoughtful husband who loves me extravagantly. I have a supportive, fun, and loving family. My friends are out of this world amazing. I am blessed beyond belief. My life is so rich and full and I feel all warm and tingly knowing that all of this is a gift from my God because He loves me. Then I am reminded that all of this amazing love I'm feeling is just a small little taste of how much HE loves me, and knows me, and thinks about me, and plans for me. It's a wonderful thing to be loved.

I'm now 25 and I'm totally loving life. Cheers.

Birthday Week! Day 2: Create

My first experiences with SLR photography were shooting a Canon 35mm. It was nothing top of the line but it was modern enough. I shot, developed the film, and printed every photo myself. My eye was totally untrained and my photos were often technically incorrect but I loved it. I thought about each photo, why I was taking it, what I wanted it to look like and spent lots and lots of time on one picture. I didn't care if the outcome was technically correct. I didn't even know what technically correct meant. I just shot what I wanted, how I wanted, and loved every second of it.


My time spent shooting with no agenda has become less and less. Photography started out being mine. A private love of my own heart. Not for others to see or notice, but for me. I was recently given a gift by a sweet family from our church. It's a cute little Minolta SRT that they bought in 1976 and didn't want anymore. I knew that this was just the excuse I needed to get back to my "roots":)

Yesterday was day 2 of 'birthday week'. For day 2 I decided to get out by myself and photograph for no other reason than the love of it. So, I read my Minolta manual, bought some film, and headed to a park down the street. It's a rather boring park but I thought that added to the challenge. I walked around for an hour and shot anything I wanted. I didn't pose, I didn't rush, I didn't shoot 500 photos. In silence and stillness I looked for the extraordinary in a seemingly boring park and took 24 photos of what I saw. It was amazing. I'm thinking this needs to be implemented in to my work week as regular thing! The whole thing was so inspiring and refreshing. And that camera... what a blast to shoot a 36 year old camera! My how things have changed in 36 years. Oh it was so much fun. There's just something about film in an old camera that's so imperfect and pretty...




I accidentally took this picture while loading the film and getting the camera ready. I like that it's my Ireland and France key chain together. We are less than two months away from our next trip! Eek!
Read about day 1 of BirthdayWeek! HERE :)

Birthday Week! Day 1: The Color Run

Birthday week has officially started!! Yes, birthday week. Birthdays are too fun to celebrate in one little day. Yesterday was day 1 of birthday week and I'd say I had quite the kick off! But more on that in a second. On Saturday I turn 25, a quarter of a century, mid twenties. I plan on celebrating my little age milestone with a little something every day this week and I'm super excited:) I'll be spending time doing some scary things, fun things, special things, etc. If a birthday is a celebration of life then I'm going to live to the fullest this week!

Yesterday was day 1 and I did something I said I'd never do. I participated in a 5k! I am in no way the picture of athleticism. It's not that I can't play sports, run, or go to the gym it's just that it doesn't interest me whatsoever. I'd much rather go on a beautiful hike or take a walk with a cute puppy. So when Lauren asked if I wanted to join her for The Color Run I was hesitant at first. 5ks and marathons have never been the type of thing I put on my bucket list. I just didn't have an ounce of desire to do one. Then I looked up the color run and changed my mind. This 5k was not about winning, running, or training. It was about one thing and one thing only. COLOR.

If everyone could participate in something like this once a month then the world be a much happier place! Haha. First off, no one cares about running. You can walk, dance, or cartwheel your way to the end. In fact, the slower you go the better because you don't want the fun to end. Secondly, all of the proceeds from the race go to a good cause. Also, this thing is just so darn fun! It was absolutely magical. I'll let the iPhone pics from the day tell the story...

Before and after. I love that the floor and the background have even changed.

You are hit with a new color at each course marker. Yellow, green, purple, then pink!

At the end of the 5k you join with the others that finished with you and have a big color celebration. Everyone gets their own color packet, you dance, cheer, and at the end of the countdown you throw your color together. It was amazing!

Dancing in the color cloud.

The ground should always look like this:)

It was a perfect day with some of my favorite ladies and the perfect kick off to birthday week. I totally want to do it again!

And now... for a photo that has made me laugh so many times. After the big color celebration we headed over to the blower guy. He stood in the middle of the circle and helped everyone de-color some for the drive home. This was my turn.... Hahahaha! And I will leave you with that. Happy Monday! I'm off to start celebrating day 2 of birthday week:)
P.S. The Color Run is coming down to San Diego in November. I would recommend it to anyone! There were people of ALL ages and lots of families with young ones. Really, this event would be fun for anyone! Check out their website if you want more information: HERE.

Adventure 2012

Before Brett and I were ever even married we talked travel. We'd dream up wild adventures and lock them away in the 'some day' section of our brains. As soon as the wedding was over we began saving and dreaming and saving. Things started falling in to place and we ended up taking our grand adventure last summer. We were away from home for a month and visited London, Southern France, Paris, Germany, Greece, Venice, Rome, Tuscany, and Ireland. We landed in New York and explored New York City, shot a wedding in New Jersey, and took a bus to Boston. We finished our summer out with a nice relaxing trip to Yosemite and then got back to real life.

Our trip had finally happened! We put a lot of time, work, and money in to last summer but it was all worth it because it was a "trip of a lifetime". It was "the trip that will scratch our traveling itch once and for all". Right? WRONG. It was within our first week back at home that we began looking at flights again for the first time. After a series of "we're crazy"s, "wait can we really do this?", "I'm on board if you're on board", "your valentine's day present is tickets to a play in London", and lots of other conversations/budgeting/praying ... It's official, we are going back!

Ahhhhhh!!! We are going back!!! My heart just did a somersault typing that. We've been researching and planning like crazy and we are almost all done booking everything. We actually just solidified our first couch surfing arrangement! I am so so excited and thankful that we have been blessed with the opportunity to do this again! Last summer truly changed us and I can't wait to see what this summer holds.

So, if you enjoyed following our adventures last year there are more to come! :)
Feel free to jump in our bags and follow us this summer to:
London
Naples, Italy
The Amalfi Coast, Italy
Tuscany, Italy
Rome, Italy
Egypt
Israel
Switzerland
Ireland (We're road tripping it! Ah!! :D)
Belgium

I already can't wait to eat my way through those countries. Has anyone been to any of these places? Any tips? :)