last week was my golden birthday. meaning i turned 23 on the 23rd. i remember being a little kid and thinking that day would neeever come and by the time it did i would be too old and boring to even care. but then i grew up and realized how young 23 actually is and that i still feel like an excited 5 year old at heart when it comes to birthdays/holidays/any excuse to celebrate. haha plus i'm starting to realize that it probably won't be any different at 33, 43, 53 etc.

luckily, it fell on a friday, so it was perfect for throwing the golden-themed birthday party i'd been dreaming about! plus i have the best/craftiest sister around, who made most of the decorations pictured above! and the best husband and friends, markell and grace, who did all of the planning and inviting and setting up! i cannot thank them enough for transforming my home into the most magical, sparkliest, shiniest, golden haven. it's been a week and i still can't bring myself to take down all of the decorations...

after everything was set up, my fear of nobody showing up dissipated when i realized i would be perfectly happy sitting on my living room floor and just basking in the goldness of it all. haha but as much as i would have loved that, i loved the fact even more that about 40 people came instead of the expected 15-20! it was such a good turnout and we spent the night roasting "golden" brown marshmallows to make s'mores over our fire pit, doing a little bit of dancing, and a lot of laughing and catching up with friends that we don't see enough of. i feel so blessed to have so many incredible, giving people in my life that really know how to make a girl feel loved and special. thank you to everybody who came! i love you all and you made my day :)

by the time the party wrapped up, i wasn't quite ready for the day to end, so nicolaus and i went hot tubbing with some friends for the after party. between waking up that morning at 7am to nicolaus bringing me fresh donuts and playing me stevie wonder's happy birthday, visiting to the aquarium, having a sushi lunch with my parents, and all the party festivities, by the time we got home in the early morning hours, i couldn't wipe the exhausted smile off my face from a long, full perfect birthday. it was truly golden ;)