I Like My Birthdays Every One. . .

I'm 36.  woo hoo.  Really the birthday has become a thing of the past.  I can remember when I was a child wondering how my parents could let such a special day pass without trumpets and fireworks going off on their behalf.  It has taken 35 years to get there, but I'm there.  I told everyone that I really didn't want anything for my birthday-and I meant it.  Greg still felt stress to make it a special day, but I wasn't worried.  I know he loves me.

So this is how we spent the day:

We visited a picturesque town in France called Annecy.  Everyone talks about it, so of course we needed to check it out.  It was definitely lovely and family friendly.

Henry and Elsa each rented one of their child size charriots.  Henry really felt powerful steering that horse around.  

Of course they had some great parks.  These ones were probably designed by some Dutch dude.  They were pretty mod.  Henry and Elsa really enjoyed the stick that spun around.  It would spin faster if you distributed your weight just right.

Having never been on a paddle boat-and it being my birthday-we decided to view the city from the lake!  It was fun and exciting balancing on the paddle boat, and trying to keep Ansel on board.  We nearly made it back to the shore before the thunderstorm.  Nearly that means we didn't.  We did make it back to shore before the mento sized hail came down!  Yikes.  It was Henry and Elsa's first memorable experience with hail.  I don't think I have ever been outside in a hail storm especially not one with such big hail.  It hurt.

The entire family was drenched.  I was wringing out the kids' clothes when we got to the car.  Nuts.  It's just part of our European assimilation-half naked children(Ansel prefers full nudity) in public. We'll have to finish our trip to Annecy another day.  It is definitely worth a return visit.