Happy Birthday to Jennifer Brown! (Guest Blog)

I'd like to wish many birthday wishes to Jennifer Brown (author of HATE LIST) as she celebrates today and also helps me celebrate birthday month today with a guest blog about her yearly birthday plans.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY JENNIFER!
Hope you had an Amazing Birthday!!!
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I'll admit it: I've always thought I had the best birthday ever! The weather's beautiful, things are happening, there aren't any other major holidays to compete with it (well, except Mother's Day, but since I always sort of considered myself the Ultimate Mother's Day gift, it works for me). It's the best!

Not to mention, my birthday hosts one of my most favorite traditions of the year: our family's first annual trip to the zoo!


Every year we do the same: pack up a picnic lunch, pile into the van, and head to the zoo for a beautiful spring day (and some rotten rainy spring days) of trekking through exhibits of lions, tigers, and yeah, you guessed it... bears (oh my!). We laugh. We hold hands. We goof off. We eat cheese and crackers by the sea lion exhibit and we feed the Lorikeets. And we... relax.

A couple years ago, my husband surprised me with a Scavenger Hunt birthday. The hunt took me all over the city, and while the hunt was fun, it sort of bummed me out because I thought it meant we wouldn't be going to the zoo. If I'm being honest, I was kinda wondering what the man was thinking, messing with tradition like that without consulting the birthday girl first! But, after following clues and pit-stopping for about three hours, I eventually followed the trail to... you got it... the zoo. There, at the gate, was my family, holding gifts and eager to get inside and play!

Over the years we've mixed it up a bit -- sometimes visiting our own zoo in Kansas City; sometimes traveling to Omaha to visit the zoo there. I've eaten birthday cake in hotel rooms, out of picnic coolers, even in a nursing home (pit stop #4 on the scavenger hunt, where my father-in-law had a clue tucked in his shirt pocket). I've worn flip-flops and shorts, sweatshirts and jeans, even rain slickers. I've spent the day with monkeys, with elephants, and with donkeys. And with my favorite animals of all -- my family.

And every year it's been wonderful. Go, May birthdays! Go to the zoo!!!
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What a fun tradition!
Once again, Happy Birthday!
thanks for stopping by.
-Jill