Another year older...

As always, at the end of every year, I get another year older. This year I turned 31. Of course, I'm totally in denial about how old I am. But hey, what can you do about it? You can't fight it.






My family were totally lovely to me all day. I think it was possibly the nicest birthday so far. This year Dan made an extra effort to buy me presents that I'd actually like (rather than shower gels and things that I could buy in Tesco myself any day of the week). I knew my presents were going to be good, as Dan and the kids kept telling me. However, Dan had paid for me to go to England to see HIM in concert (for my birthday) so it really should have been a quiet day.

On Saturday morning I was awoken in bed by an extremely excited Barney. Of course he helped me open everything, and got more pleasure out of it than you could think possible.


Dan had really made an effort to buy fabulous gifts, and I was totally delighted. Amoungst other things I was given:





This book about HIM (Ville Valo) with hundreds of sexy photos of the man himself (a bit of bedtime reading! hehe).





An encyclopeadia of Heavy Metal Music (this is a dream gift for me - I know others may not appreciate it).





An MP3 player, new perfume, the new biography about Anthony Keidis from the Red Hot Chili Peppers entitled Scar Tissue ( I can't wait to get stuck into this), a book called 'What is Goth?' which is truly hilarious and informative (my new goth name is Marquesa Demona Enchantress of the Innocents & Dans is Master Vlad Defiler of the Virgins!!!!) a new handbag sized good camera, Nigella Lawsons cookbook for good quality fast family food, and lots lots more. My Mum gave me a beautiful red dress too. After a serious amount of present opening Dan and the kids took me to the new Ed's Diner thats opened up nearby and we stuffed ourselves silly.

Since it wasn't possible to fit 31 candles into a cake, I was presented by Annabelle with towering inferno of flames on a cheese cake. (see top photo) How novel!





My Mum kindly agreed to take the kids overnight on Saturday night so we were able to go into Belfast and meet up with some friends. My sister Maddi & her partner Tom came too, as well as some of the lovely belly dancing girls I've made friends with recently. It's so hard to get people at this time of year as everyone is so busy, so we decided to go out rather than have a party or anything.



























First pic is of me all dressed up and ready to go out. Second pic is me wearing the cool hat and gloves that Maddi bought me!




Two of my lovely belly dancing friends with me, Jools on the left, and Aleksandra on the right.





This is me on the left and my sister Maddi on the right. She fell in love with the hat and gloves she gave me and I rather thought I wasn't going to get them back!

Tom and Dan, two of the luckiest men in the world, in my opinion!

So, all in all I had a fabulous day. We had a great laugh in Laverys with friends, and a bit of a boogie too. Dan and I went back to Jools house for a kebab, which I horsed down as if I'd not eaten in a month!

Thanks to Dan for making it such a nice day, and to everyone for the lovely presents, and for the people who came out with me and made it such a nice night.