On Sun­day I turned…thirty-one. It has become a tra­di­tion of sorts for me to write a birth­day reflec­tion post. I’ve done so for the last cou­ple of years, I like doing it… so don’t expect me to stop.

This year I decided to do some­thing different.

On the after­noon of the thirty-first year of my birth I was sit­ting in my car mini-van with my two boys wait­ing for my hus­band to lock up the house. We were going out to din­ner to cel­e­brate my birth­day. (I totally got carded at the restau­rant BTW!) My son was doing some­thing cute so I snapped a few pics. Then snapped a few more of me. The visor’s mir­ror was down and I started to think about my birth­day post… and as I looked at the girl woman in the mir­ror I reflected on what I saw and how I’ve changed from the young woman of 21 to now. That twenty-one year old is still here in many respects, she’s just a whole heck of a lot wiser. I was very happy with the per­son I saw in the mir­ror as her regrets are few and she’s per­fectly pleased with where she is in life.

Me at 31. What’s impor­tant to me: My mar­riage, my chil­dren, writ­ing, fam­ily, friends.… being fabulous.

Me at 21. What was impor­tant to her: fam­ily, friends, being fab­u­lous, Phi Mu, hav­ing an expertly crafted manicure.

Oh, and appar­ently we have the same taste in hair­styles.… and if this hap­pens to be the first post of mine that you’ve read… no I haven’t had the same hair­style for ten years… that would be decid­edly un–fab­u­lous!