Day 4: 27 is the new black

I still can't believe I turned 27 in January! I never even got used to the idea of being 26, and I accidentally told someone I was 28. It's somewhere in there. 

Shane threw me an awesome early birthday party with all of our friends, and made me a delicious Funfetti cake.  Of course I'm really forgetful, so I forgot to take pictures of anything but the cake. What can I say, it was THAT good. 

Just looking at it makes my mouth water. I love it and hate it when Shane bakes. I love it because everything he makes is delicious. And I hate it because everything he makes is DELICIOUS! He's a much better baker than I am too, and it makes me jealous of his skill. I've yet to master a two layer cake and he went straight to four!

Yum! 

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I went to Knoxville to spend a week with my parents and sister, and since I was there on my actual birthday day, I got a second party! Lucky me :) 

My family introduced me to the magic that is The French Market Crêperie and we're all a little bit obsessed. Of course birthday cake #2 had to be a plate of their delicious imported French macarons. Gosh, why do I keep making myself so hungry? I may have to take a Nutella break here in a minute. 

The awesome Hello Kitty in the background was one of my birthday presents, and yes I did pick it out myself. I also got a macaron kit and recipe book so I can fuel the addiction at home. Best of all, a running watch that I can use to help run off all the cake and macarons! Solid plan, if you ask me. 

We had to do something fun to celebrate, so my parents, my sister, and I went to Painting with a Twist, one of those paint while you drink places. Continuing with the French theme we HAD to paint the Eiffel Tower in the snow. 

Our paintings turned out really, um, differently from the example picture. Not bad, but not fantastic. We weren't even drinking while painting. My tower turned out a little chunky due to the fact that I refused to use the stencil and insisted on free-handing the shape myself. One lady got pissed that her picture didn't look "realistic" enough. I don't know what she was expecting, just look at the sample. And also, how did she expect to learn how to paint a photo real Eiffel Tower in just two hours?

I've been to one of these painting places before, and that time it was ALL women in attendance. My dad was worried that he would stick out like a sore thumb, but turned out that was me and my sister. It must've been some sort of couples night, because my sister and I were the only ones in class without dates. 

Here's a blurry picture of the whole family with our paintings! We had a good time, especially because our painting neighbors were pretty entertaining. 

Aww, aren't we adorable? I'm sure you can tell, but left to right it's me, my dad, my mom, and my sister, Hannah.

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The most permanent and most painful gift I received that week was this amazing ink from Shane's sister's fiancé and our new friend, Doc Cooper, owner of Saint Tattoo (you should check out his instagram). I let him completely design the piece, which is a tribute to my sorority Delta Gamma. My only stipulations were that I wanted an anchor, the Greek letters ΤΔΗ, and three of something to represent our three founders. 

He based the piece off of two different designs by Ben Corday, a famous tattoo artist from the early 1900s. It's totally traditional and I'm absolutely in love. It's motivated me to work hard on leg day so I can show it off well this summer! 

So far, 27 is turning out great! 

Twenty-three!

Last week was my birthday, so Shane wanted to take me to do something fun. I decided on going to the Baltimore Museum of Art for their Andy Warhol show. Well, the museum closes super early on weekdays. Then I decided on the Aquarium. Guess what else closes early on a Thursday? We ended up just going to dinner and a movie and left the others for that Saturday. 

Going down into the city, we took the Light Rail. There weren't any stops close to the museum, so we just picked the one that looked the closest, and said we could take the bus from there. When we got off the light rail, I got the bright idea that maybe we should just walk instead. I looked at the map and it didn't look too far, plus it was pretty much a straight shot from where we were. A good 30-45 minutes later (I didn't check the scale on the map, ok? not my fault) we finally made it to the museum. We were both frozen head to toe and so thankful to be inside. Honestly, sometimes I think I need a full snowsuit to walk around outside here. 

After the museum we headed down to the Aquarium. We went to the bus stop this time, we weren't going to walk all the way to the harbor. We waited...and waited...and waited. When the bus was 20 minutes late, we decided to just go ahead and start walking. Thank goodness the bus met up with us at the next stop! 

The harbor area was really nice, we went into a few of the shops they have down there. They are mostly for tourists, so if you ever need to buy one of these...

...now you know where to go. We also saw the fudge shop where Sisqo was discovered (yes, the one who sang the Thong Song). I was most excited just to get something to eat, I was starving! 

Next we went to the Aquarium. It was really neat! A lot of it reminded me of the Tennessee Aquarium in Chattanooga. I am glad that Debbie and Steve (a.k.a. Shane's parents) got us passes so we can go back a lot!

And just because...