My birthday tends to fall on weird days – days with tons midterms when I was in college and high school, days when there is a ton of things going on, etc, etc. It seems to be in the heart of the busy time leading up to spring.

This year was no different, as this year was the Friday before our Spring break began, but with a bunch more things thrown in. First off, because I was having a PET scan done later that day, not only could I not eat at all and had to fast during the day (think “hangry” teacher), but I wasn’t allowed to eat any carbs or sugar for about 24 hours beforehand. Happy birthday to me 😉😜.

My students all still sang to me and had me wear my special birthday glasses, however. Also, although most of the kids and parents were so in prepping for spring break mode that they forgot my birthday, sweet Lily in my homeroom brought donuts for us to have a celebration. It was the sweetest, and she knew I had to wait to eat mine, and was totally understanding. (Oh, and my principal, whose hobby is to decorate cookies, made this gorgeous cookie for me.)

To make the school day even crazier, we had an assembly first thing. It was a “Lion Leader” assembly, and Addy and Jaydin were my amazing recipients. We had a competition during the assembly, and I was was the participant from fourth grade. We were against an opponent and were given a word, and then had to sing a song that had that word in it. My first word was “dream,” and so I easily won singing the Everly Brothers’ song “Dream.” For round two, the word was “always,” and my mind was blank. Kandice grabbed the microphone first, but she couldn’t remember a song, so she passed me the mic and I sang, “Always remember you . . .” – what?? I was singing to the tune of Sarah McLachlan’s song, but the real words are “I will remember you . . .” It didn’t hit me until 4th grade celebrated our win that I had accidentally cheated. So embarrassing!! And seriously, there are so many songs with always in them. Wow. I blame being hungry – ha ha!

We had a short amount of time in our room, and I showed my class the show “It’s the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown.” By then it was time for the other crazy thing in our day – a schoolwide outdoor picnic with families invited. Sadly, between not being able to eat, and the fact that it was threatening rain, I was not super excited about it. Especially when parents would notice I wasn’t eating and offer me yummy food. So lame. The kids loved it though, even when it was windy and rained on them a bit. Good times.

By the time we made it back to the classroom, it was about time to get ready to leave, so we cleaned the classroom really well, since we were going to be gone for a week.

After the kids left, I packed up my stuff and headed straight to the radiology office for my PET scan. They injected me with who knows what crazy stuff, as it was in this metal canister that made it seem radioactive or super dangerous. Super exciting to get that pumped into me 😬.

The best part, however, was that I had to sit for an hour for it to make its way through my body, and so they put me in a dim room with a comfy recliner, and I fell sound asleep while listening to my audiobook. That was a birthday gift, for sure.

After the PET scan, I had an MRI, and I about laughed out loud when the tech asked me if I had ever had an MRI before. I have had so many, that I lost count months ago. Good times.

Eventually, I was able to go home – wahoo! Kevin was out picking up Olive Garden dinner for my birthday meal, and I could not eat soon enough. It was delicious and wonderful, and then it was time for presents. The kids and Kevin all got me very sweet gifts from my wishlist, and I am very excited for my new purple dress I am saving to wear for Easter. We even facetimed Lily for the gifts, so she could be part of everything.

For desert, Kevin found an amazing caramel cheesecake at Costco. It was delicious!

After dessert, we had family movie night and we watched one of my all time favorite movies, “While You Were Sleeping.” So good! And then we finished the day with madly trying to get packed so we could leave super early for our trip to Florida for spring break. So although it wasn’t an ideal birthday, it turned out to be a good birthday.

PS. This past week at school just happened to be “Read Across America” week, and so we had dress up days. I was pretty preoccupied with some things with my health and things, that I completely forgot to get pictures of the kids or myself. Except for a selfie I took on pajama day. Oh well.