Today’s my 38th birthday — and for someone who is objectively terrible at keeping things brief, I had absolutely no idea what to write about.
But if this blog has taken on a singular theme lately, it’s been gratitude. Not necessarily the kind that’s tied to big milestones or picture-perfect moments. The kind that sneaks up on you during a quiet afternoon or halfway through a (giant, thank you very much!) slice of cheesecake.
I decided to jot down 38 things I’m thankful for today. No overthinking.
Here goes:
- Family, especially John and the kiddos.
- Friends.
- My assurance of Jesus’ love.
- My health. I know many people never make it to their 38th birthday, and what a gift it is just to be alive and breathing.
- I know how to read! Books bring me so much joy.
- Cheesecake.
- Access to dental floss after eating popcorn or a mango.
- Bedtime snuggles.
- Music.
- Sunny days.
- How John puts away the groceries so I don’t have to.
- Beautiful sunsets.
- I know how to drive a car. I cannot imagine life without this skill.
- Checking the mail and discovering a handwritten note from a friend.
- The sound of cicadas on warm summer afternoons.
- That first sip of a hot beverage in the morning.
- Silly memes that make me laugh out loud.
- Nights I fall asleep the moment my head hits the pillow.
- Christmas. Always and forever, Christmas.
- Naps.
- The smell of freshly-cut grass.
- Leaving the library with a stack of books I’m excited to read.
- Quiet afternoons when I have the house to myself.
- Friday evening — my favourite night of the week if it includes an at-home date night.
- Walking into the house after the floors have been mopped.
- Eating ice cream on a hot day.
- Magic bags (the perfect antidote for my perpetually cold feet).
- Peanut butter and banana on toast.
- Hot showers.
- Rocking in the POÄNG chair in the corner of our living room.
- Earrings. They make me so happy!
- Sitting in front of a wood stove on a cold day.
- Finding a new-to-me outfit I love at a thrift store.
- Birdsong.
- Sunday mornings at church.
- Eufy. Modern technology has lots of downsides, but a robotic vacuum cleaner is pure genius!
- My blog. A few years ago it didn’t even exist, and now I can’t imagine life without this incredible online community.
- What lies ahead. I’m excited to see where this next trip around the sun takes me.
Your turn. Help me create a gratitude party!
- What are some things you’re thankful for today?
- What’s your favourite birthday meal/dessert? Do you ask for/receive the same thing every year, or do you like to mix things up a bit?
- What’s your favourite night of the week?
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K @ TS
Happy birthday!! I hope the sun shines on you all day long, but not in an oppressive hot way. 😁
I am thankful for coffee, and having legs and feet that can carry me to many places. I don’t know what I would (or will) do if they stop working well. I am thankful for the people and experiences that have given me an adventurous spirit. Have a great day, friend!
Elisabeth
Thanks, friend. It is very hot and sunny and is bordering on oppressive, but there is a fresh cheesecake chilling in the fridge!!!
Molly F.C.
Happy Birthday to you, Elisabeth!
I am grateful for my health. I have a few concerns but overall, I’m pretty healthy. Need to kick things up a huge notch in the self care department which is what this summer is for.
Grateful that I may worship God without fear of persecution.
My family. We are a small but tight knit group.
Our darling Pup who brings unconditional love to the party.
Grateful for my horse who turns 25 today!
Hope you have a splendid day. 😊
Elisabeth
All the best with your Summer of Self-Care!!
Happy birthday to your horse; my equine birthday buddy.
mbmom11
Have a glorious birthday, Elisabeth!
I’m thankful for diet coke, hot water heaters, and cats. Summer vacation starts for my kids today – rough school year so I’m glad it’s over. And it’s raining- not fun for swimming, but the house is quiet and maybe everyone will sleep in.
Elisabeth
Such an important distinction with hot water heaters. I’m thankful for running water, but my heart always and forever is with our hot water tank!!!
I’m sorry it was a hard school year. It gets so exhausting by the end of a slog and I’m sure you’re both relieved and also weary to the bone. I hope everyone slept in and gave you some extra peace and quiet. I hope the summer is restorative and that the school year ahead goes much more smoothly <3
sarah
Happy birthday– this is a wonderful list
Nicole MacPherson
HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!! *throws confetti, immediately sweeps up confetti*
Wishing you the best year to come! I am grateful to have you in my life! I hope you get all the unbaked cherry cheesecake your heart desires, with a peanut butter and banana toast chaser and maybe some Twizzlers! Yay, it’s Elisabeth Day!
Elisabeth
I so appreciate the neatness of your celebration.
Nicole, THERE IS CHEESECAKE CHILLING IN THE FRIDGE THIS VERY SECOND and I will eat a giant slab of it tonight and, hopefully, a slice tomorrow morning for breakfast as well.
Catrina
I loved reading this – it felt like a gentle walk through your life, one thankful step at a time. What a beautiful list! It’s full of simple joys, which, honestly, are the best kind.
I am grateful for the little mobile heater currently humming away next to me. Our apartment isn’t heated, and South Africa sliding into autumn now – that warm air is bliss on a cold and rainy day!
Hope your day includes cheesecake, naps, and maybe even a quiet house for a few minutes! Here’s to the year ahead! 🥂
Elisabeth
Catrina, I cannot tell you how satisfied and happy this made me: “it felt like a gentle walk through your life, one thankful step at a time.”
It’s hard to conceptualize other countries are heading into fall/winter as we’re emerging from winter/spring into summer! Though last week was so cold and rainy I wore my snow coat TWICE. I love our space heaters and use them regularly in my office, in combination with my heated foot mat which I simply adore so my toes stay warm and toasty.
No naps yet, but the house is still quiet and there is cheesecake in the fridge.
Mamie
Happiest of birthdays! 🎉
Grateful:
Dogs, coffee, Diet Coke, nature, summer vacation (I’m a teacher), and a supportive spouse.
Birthday treat: For the last several years, my husband and I have relied on small, tasty cakes from our local grocery store’s bakery. Tasty and reasonably priced!
Favorite night: I think Thursday because knowing the next day is the last day of the work week and that the weekend is almost here is a delightful feeling!
Elisabeth
Your birthday treat sounds delicious. And always wonderful to outsource the baking of one’s celebratory cakes!
Hooray for summer vacation. I’m not sure where you live, but hope you’re either already enjoying the break or are anticipating its arrival very soon!
Lindsay
Happy, happy birthday! I hope your day is everything you want it to be and a bit more!
Today, I am thankful for my Mr. bringing me up breakfast since I still can’t do stairs, with a side of dad jokes. Warm tea in my chilly office chair. The anticipation of a library hold after work. Lil Momma secretly texting me from the school bathroom.
I am not an extravagant birthday meal-er, more so an ingredient-er. I always hope my birthday includes apple pie for breakfast, either french fries or movie popcorn, and a warm and chewy chocolate chip cookie.
During the school year, my favourite night of the week is Tuesday because my daughter and I have a school bedtime girls’ night while her dad is at darts. During the non-school times, my favorite night is Saturday, because we aren’t Friday-tired from work and aren’t Sunday-prepping for the week.
Elisabeth
What a long few months you’ve had, but hooray for hand-delivered breakfast.
I can so relate to the joy of getting a library hold. One of the delights of being a reader.
Jenny
HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELISABETH!!!!!!!!!! I love Nicole throwing and sweeping up confetti- me too!!! I hope you have an amazing day with all your favorite things. I love your gratitude list, and so many of those are on my list too. Even when things seem like they’re not going well, we still have so much- our health, our families, our homes, and on and on.
I’m thankful that today is my day off and I’m sitting in Barnes and Noble! It’s quiet and peaceful and I’m surrounded by books. And I’m sitting a nice, hot “cup of caffeine” (aka gunpowder green tea, lol.)
Have a fantastic day!
Elisabeth
I appreciated how Nicole kept things neat and tidy 🙂
Barnes and Noble and books and tea. I know you’d prefer to be drinking Earl Grey (Joy took me out for a birthday “coffee” and I picked Earl Grey, so I enjoyed one for you), but I hope it’s still fantastic.
Jacquie
Happy birthday, Elisabeth! I hope you have a beautiful day that continues throughout the year!
It is my daughter’s birthday today too – she is 34. I am grateful that she stayed over night last night and we are going to spend the day together visiting VanDusen Gardens in Vancouver – a beautiful garden that has a special “Fleur de Villes” art installation with a Downton Abbey theme. It is a warm, sunny day and couldn’t be a more perfect day for us to do this activity! She is not a cake person, but loves ice cream, so I am sure there will be some of that happening later today.
I am also grateful that my husband had the coffee ready this morning and today is one of our morning gym days together.
My favourite day of the week is Thursday. It used to be my day off from work and we often went out for dinner so it always felt like a nice way to ease into the coming, often busy, weekend.
Elisabeth
That’s so fun to learn I have another birthday buddy (I already learned I’m birthday buddy with one reader’s horse, so another human is different).
I hope you have a wonderful celebration today – with ice cream – and the gardens sound absolutely gorgeous! Enjoy the gym (and coffee!).
Maureen
Just saying Happy Birthday and enjoy your day.
Ernie
Happy, happy birthday to you! You’re so young. Wow. Not even 40 years old.
My fav birthday meal is anything that I’ve not cooked. Ha. Coach often takes me out for a steak at my favorite restaurant, and I love it. Such a treat with amazing mashed potatoes. I love a GF bundt cake or a flourless cake or ice cream. I’m a bit limited because of celiac, but I do love dessert, so something I don’t usually eat is right up my alley.
Right now my favorite night of the week would probably be Friday, but I back it up to include Friday late afternoon. Coach and I have built in respite, because the girls go to therapy that day and they have a driver compliments of DCFS.
Elisabeth
Amen to enjoying food not prepared by your own two hands.
I know it’s tricky to accommodate your dietary needs, but I’m glad there are delicious things like flourless cake (that was my go-to for Indy for years because his best friend needs to avoid gluten). Speaking of which…I haven’t made that cake in ages and it is SO delicious. Yum.
It’s nice to have a break from the demands of parenting and responsibility, and I can only imagine the added stress and responsibility because of your foster/adoption situation. Plus, being finished with daycare responsibilities, too, must feel glorious!
Stacey in the UK
HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELISABETH!!!!
I hope you have a fantabulous day and are spoiled rotten 🙂
Elisabeth
Thank you! There is a cheesecake in the fridge this minute and John and the kids made me breakfast this morning, followed by coffee with Joy so…YES! Spoiled rotten and enjoying it.
Bijoux
Happy, happy birthday! Yeah for May birthdays! It means the end of school and the start of summer, both always brought me such happiness as a parent of school age kids. I loved so many of your favorite things, though I can always do without cicadas. My fave night of the week has always been Friday, the start of the weekend. It’s also date night for me and my husband. My fave birthday meal is always just going out to eat so I can choose whatever I want. I always ask for consumables as gifts . . . lotions, shower gel, candles, specialty food items.
Elisabeth
Yay for another Friday night fan. It is definitely my favourite time. The week is over, no lunchboxes to prep. And as much as I LOVE church on Sunday morning, there is something so liberating about Saturday being the one day we usually don’t have somewhere to be early in the day.
Lisa's Yarns
Happy birthday! I love your list of 38 items! I hope today is a wonderful day and that you get spoiled by your family!
We do not do birthday gifts in the house for adults since Phil and I are firmly NOT GIFT PEOPLE. Sometimes we’ll give the person a gift of time to do what they’d like. I mostly do this for Phil since he is not great about taking time off unless we have a vacation planned. I have arranged rounds of golf for him in the past which is so freaking much work and frustratingly difficult… For myself, I will use birthdays to get a pricier tech gadget, like an Apple Watch, Airpods, or my Oura ring. But I can buy it at any time – I just feel more entitled to it around my birthday!
Today I am grateful that it’s going to be overcast/rainy because we are struggling to find sunscreen that Will doesn’t react to. So I need some overcast days to figure out a solution.
Elisabeth
We don’t generally do birthday gifts for adults either. I’m fine with that. I just want my cheesecake 🙂
I totally get (and do the same thing) about spendier purchases. Somehow they feel more valid around my birthday.
Julia
Happy birthday, Elisabeth! I just turned 37 a few weeks ago- we are pretty close!
My favorite birthday dessert is a Mississippi mud cake. It is rich and delicious and has Kahlua AND coffee in the batter.
Elisabeth
I’ve never had Mississippi Mud Cake, but what a fun and festive name for a cake so for that reason alone it sounds like a great birthday dessert!
Happy belated birthday!
Joy
Number 7 made me laugh – ah yes, it’s the little things isn’t it! Happy birthday, Friend! The world is a better place because you’re in it!
I too am thankful for earrings – they are so pretty and give me a little bit of joy every time I put them on or look in the mirror. I’m kind of obsessed with hoops lately.
Hope today is super special and hope & pray for so much goodness for you in the coming year!!
Elisabeth
Earrings are so fun. I’m not sure why I’ve latched on to them (I’m not much for any other jewellery).
There is little on earth more frustrating than getting a kernel of popcorn stuck between one’s teeth…and little more satisfying than finally getting it out!
Thanks for helping make today special and festive.
Rebecca (the Farm Wife)
Happy birthday! 😀 I hope this next trip around the sun is incredible blessed and fabulous <3
I alternate between wanting chocolate cake + cream cheese frosting OR cheesecake OR cookies, haha … My husband and I have birthdays just over a week apart, and our tradition is to each pick somewhere "fancy" to go out for lunch. We eat really good for two weeks in the summer, lol
Things that make me happy/I'm forever grateful for: when the coffee-to-creamer ratio is perfect … watching my little chickens do their chicken things … growing a garden … fresh cut flowers … golden hour sun glow … fireflies … kitten cuddles … cheesy pizza … oversized sweatshirts … FaceTiming my niece and nephew …
Elisabeth
Anything cream cheese just sings. my. name. I love cream cheese frosting. I like carrot cake, but really I only like carrot cake because of the cream cheese frosting.
What a fun couple tradition. Two weeks feels like the perfect distance to make a longer stretch feel festive without any one birthday overshadowing the other.
When the coffee to creamer ratio is perfect is SUCH A GOOD one. Yes and yes. Also love oversized sweaters (or loungewear of almost any sort).
Suzanne
It’s your birthday, woot woot woot!!! Loved this list of things you’re grateful for. I’m grateful for your blog, and that I got to meet you in person, and that my kid adores your kid so much.
Hope your day has so much cherry cheesecake in it!!!!! But not so much that you get sick or sick of it!!!!!
Elisabeth
Yes, there will be cheesecake.
Thanks so much for the kind text this morning AND YOUR CARD ARRIVED. Thank you for all the birthday love, Suzanne <3
Colleen Martin
Happy happy 38th Birthday Elisabeth! I am so grateful to have connected with you via blogging, as your posts always make me smile 🙂
J
Happy Birthday Elisabeth! I hope you’re having a lovely day. I will celebrate you by going out to dinner and having a big salad and a glass of wine. My birthday dessert of choice is usually ice cream, though I saw some tarts the other day that I’m keeping in mind for when the time comes.
Elisabeth
Always good to be prepared and plan ahead.
There were definitely a number of treats in Paris I wouldn’t turn my nose up at on my birthday 🤣
Rebecca Jo
What a great way to celebrate your birthday by looking at those silver linings around your life.
Hope you have a WONDERFUL trip around the sun!
Gigi
Happy, happy birthday dear Elisabeth! And your list is fire. Now I want cheesecake.
Elisabeth
I enjoyed a giant slice last night for the both of us!!
NGS
Today I am grateful for a great husband, understanding co-workers, and the ability to problem solve. Also, a generous PTO policy at my job that I am taking advantage of these days. *sigh*
I hope you get lots of (cheese)cake and ice cream!!
Elisabeth
I know things have been tough this year, so I’m thankful for all those things in your life, too!!
I had cheesecake!!
Maria
Happy happy (+36 more happys) birthday! May you have a fantastic year of being 38!
Some gratitude for your birthday:
– a beautiful sunny day
– the mix of colours of early spring leaves
– bird song
– funny books that distract and make me laugh
– stroller walks with the kids
– messages from friends
Elisabeth
Your happy things brought a smile to my face. Sending yet more hugs your way ❤️
Birchie
Happy birthday!!!! Enjoy every delicious taste of that cheesecake <3
Elisabeth
I had a giant slice last night and plan to enthusiastically hit repeat this evening!!
Elinoora
Happy birthday!!!
I wish you an amazing ‘level-up day’ with the perfect amounts of cheesecake, Earl grey and lighthouses.
Things to be grateful for:
– good meeting for the gymnastics club
– my bed and pillow
– I put a chicken in the oven and the kids loved it (I’ve not done this before as they never liked chicken much but I really wanted to give it go)
– sunshine
– plum whiskey
– Understanding friends
– my husband and kids
Birthday foods:
– I love a good gravad lax (preferably made by my mom) (as a starter) and paella for my main dish.
– dessert, yes please. Apple crumble or baked cheesecake or really good éclairs or mattentaart (I have no idea how to translate this but it’s a flakey crust with a kind of almondy filling) or really good ice cream. There used to be a bakery near where I used to live as a kid that did this amazing pie, with apple and cream and merengue and almond slivers. It was great, we even had it at our wedding. Sadly, the bakery no longer exists *snifs*
Elisabeth
That pie sounds delectable!
I love calling it a “level-up” day! I think this is the first time I’ve heard it and I’m adding it to my vocabulary moving forward! I passed the grade!
Joy
Happy Birthday! I hope you’ve had an amazing day.
Today I was thankful for an extra couple of hours at home in the morning, a bowl of fresh blueberries, umbrellas and raincoats, and a friend willing to read a big book with me this summer to help me finish it.
Elisabeth
What a happy list. I enjoyed blueberries yesterday, too. Berries are my favourite fruit.
And if it has to rain, having the right gear makes all the difference.
Diane
Happy Birthday!!! I hope you celebrated appropriately! I hope your family is grateful for you. I know I am!
“dental floss” made me laugh – can you imagine what it was like before dental floss? makes me shudder.
Today I was thankful for waterproof boots and umbrellas because the weather has been so so so very soggy these last few days.
Elisabeth
Proper footwear – suitable for the weather – is such a good thing.
Dental floss is oddly specific but goodness it is handy. I HATE having things stuck in my teeth.
Michelle G
Happy birthday to you, my friend! You are one of the very special wonderful people in the world, and I am thankful that I met you through blogging! I hope you thoroughly enjoy being 38 years old! I don’t really have a go to birthday treat. I do love red velvet cupcakes, but I would take anything! Your cheesecake sounds amazing!
Elisabeth
I remember you love red velvet!! Yummy.
Katy @PracticalWalk
Happy birthday!!!
We’re close in age, I’ll be 38 at the end of the year.
Elisabeth
Birthday year (buddies!).
coco
Happy birthday Elizabeth! love your list! it’s really a great day to pause and reflect the abundance we have.
I am grateful for a nice music filled easy run, office gym that’s just for me, husband driving me to work, the view from my desk (like being in a national park), and so much more.
My favorite night of the week is probably Friday. And I don’t have a tradition for birthday celebration nor cake as it’s christmas and we are usually traveling.