Happy Birthday to Me...A Gift Or Two

It's my birthday today, and I have spent the entire day doing what my friend Anna calls "being good to myself," which is actually something we frown upon because it means you are self-indulgent. However, the older I get the more I don't feel guilty about doing what I want to do one day out of the year. It's a good place to be. Tomorrow it's back to self-imposed restrictive lifestyles, but today, I'm living in the now.

One of the things I wanted to do this year was eat a delicious birthday cake, since it's been a long time since I had one of those. I usually opt for ice cream or gluten free cheesecake or something not cakey, but this year I had Eleanor's Bake Shop make me a delicious chocolate cake with cream cheese frosting. And it was divine. Look at this cake! And look at how big it is in comparison to my cute little girl waiting for a piece of it in the background. Here's how it looked when we sliced into it. A birthday gift, indeed.

The second thing I gave myself for my birthday was a trip to the Altitude Design Summit blogging conference here in Salt Lake City this weekend. I'm so excited to go and learn all kinds of new things and see what the serious bloggers are up to. I'm hoping to get some great inspiration for my blogging and finally learn how to really use my new camera. Stephanie Nielsen from the Nie Nie Dialogues is speaking, as well as Heather Armstrong and Brenda Dargen from marthastewart.com. I may die a happy death while I'm there! I'll hopefully have some fun pictures and stories when I get back to blogging on Monday. Until then, enjoy the weekend and go ahead and be jealous of my cake. Happy eating!