My 30th Birthday + A Weekend of House Showings

Well this past weekend was just a total whirlwind of running around 100 mph (which we all know is the speed Erica DeSpain is the most comfortable with anyway! haha), but man… it was so good too. So so so so very good! Excited to chit chat and share about our happenings!

Around 2 a.m. on the morning of my 30th birthday (Friday), I got a text from my brother-in-law that my sister was in labor and progressing rapidly! Her due date was the 23rd, but all along she had a feeling he would come on my birthday, and her intuition as his mama was right. At 9:02 a.m. (German time), my new best buddy Luke came into our world. He is so perfect, and my heart aches more than I can describe on this blog for how badly I long to hold him. I know he’ll be my nephew forever though, so we’ll have a lifetime to make memories and get into all kinds of trouble together. Isn’t he handsome? Swoon. I’m so happy for and proud of my sister and brother-in-law. He was the best birthday gift!

Sadie must have known it was my birthday because at 5:30 a.m. she was up and hollering to party! Oy. Jamie was out in the field overnight (he got home around lunchtime), so I got up and we started the day. Since both girls seemed to have woken up on the wrong side of the bed, I grabbed my Panera gift card from my aunt and we headed there for breakfast before taking Hadley to school.

I’m not sure we’ve ever had breakfast at Panera (we usually don’t eat breakfast out period), but the girls totally loved it! It was surprisingly a really sweet way to kick off our Friday, so I think we’ll do this more often. 🙂

Hadley said “I want to give birthday kisses!” and then kissed her sister. Sadie’s like “Uh, that’s enough. Thanks. Let me eat my eggs.”

After school drop-off, Sadie and I walked around Target for a bit (one of my happy places) before going home to drop off her with Jamie so that I could go get a 9round workout in. I did my birthday burpees (Thanks Tim! haha) and got in a great sweat session before swinging by to pick up Hadley from school.

Once we got home, the girls had some nap/rest time while Jamie and I cleaned and straightened up the house for a 3 p.m. showing. A couple was coming back to see it for the second time, so we were really meticulous with making every single thing look perfect!

Since it was in the 50s and gorgeous out, we decided to go to one of my favorite places, Konza Praire, and hike during the showing.

We’ve been bringing Hadley here for about a year and a half, and it’s been fun to see her go from being in a carrier on our backs to being able to easily hike the entire thing on her own.

Love this girl so much! Exploring and hiking with her is so enjoyable because everything is so fascinating to her. We count steps, jump over rocks, run across bridges… everything is just more silly and fun.

We had originally planned to eat dinner at a Japanese hibachi place that evening, but after our hike, the last thing I wanted to do was go home to get everybody all put together to go out to dinner. Olive Garden take-out sounded fabulous to me, so we ordered it and picked it up on our way home from hiking. Jamie thought I was bananas that this was the birthday dinner I wanted, but honestly just being with Jamie and the kids was all I wanted.

I don’t want to sound overly whiney, but Jamie has missed all but two of my birthdays the last 10 years or so, so having him around to hang with was more than I could ask for. I felt very loved and was totally fine not doing a big birthday dinner out. We drank wine at home, immensely enjoyed our Olive Garden, and relaxed. Oh, and the girls played with toys together until bedtime without any screaming or fighting. Hallelujah! Best day ever. 🙂

And let me tell ya about the gift that made me sob my guts out. Like, I could not stop crying. I don’t know what got into me, but this little book that Jamie put together touched me so much.

He reached out to my immediate family, his parents, and around a dozen of my long-time closest girlfriends and asked them to write me a short birthday message along with a favorite picture of us together. He put it all together in secret via a photobook he made online. He gave it to me the night before my birthday because he had to go out to the field and wouldn’t be around in the morning, but I think he gave it to me early because he just couldn’t stand holding on to it anymore (he struggles with holding in secrets big time!) He was so excited to give it to me, and for good reason!

As a sidenote, I couldn’t believe he figured out how to create a photobook! Ha! I think this shocked me as much as the thought of the gift did. 🙂

On Saturday, we had three showings back to back, so we had to be out of the house for four hours. Jamie suggested we take Teddy to doggy daycare so that we could actually get out and enjoy doing something, so that’s what we did! After we dropped him off, we headed to Topeka to the Kansas Children’s Discovery Center.

We’d been once before when Hadley was Sadie’s age, so we were way overdue for another visit. The girls had a ball playing for almost two hours before we got back in the car and headed home. Kansas friends, I highly recommend a trip to this place, especially on a pretty day because there’s so much to explore outside as well as in.

On Sunday, the girls were up bright and early again (womp womp). We enjoyed a slow morning drinking coffee and putting together puzzles with the girls, and then leisurely got ready for church and an Aldi trip.

While we were in church, I got a text from our realtor that WE HAD AN OFFER!!! Actually, we had TWO offers! One of them was a bit of a joke though (they low-balled us an unreasonable amount, so that offer basically went out the window for both us and for them), but another family came in with an exceptional offer as well as a closing date that works for us. Needless to say, champagne was in order!

As I write this Monday evening, I admit that the adrenaline has worn off a bit as the reality of everything that lies ahead of us the next few weeks sets in. There’s a tremendous amount to do to “close out” our lives here in Kansas as well as an equally long list of things to do to get set up in Alabama.

I’m not complaining though… definitely not complaining. I’m ultimately beyond grateful for the to-do lists because they mean that things are rockin’ and rollin’ as they should and as we prayed they would, but knowing that we need to use every single day to its max potential to get everything done right and on time is pretty daunting for this extroverted introvert. I like/need ample downtime sprinkled amidst busyness, but I think I’m just going to need to keep my sites set on May when we can kick our feet up, be settled in our home and with Jamie’s job, and have all of this behind us.

Let’s chat!

Just for fun, what is your favorite champagne?

Have you ever sent your dog to doggy daycare?

How have you kept yourself busy in the past during your house showings? What did you get out and do?