Friends

Last night my friends and I went out to dinner to celebrate my birthday. It's not actually until next Saturday, but on Thursday Mr. Sneaker and I are heading to Cali to visit his parents, then to CT to visit my family and attend a wedding, then I get to see my BFF in Virginia before returning to Germany, so I won't be here to celebrate on the 26th.

We started the evening at my place to watch the most recent episode of the Bachelorette. We made predictions about who will be the final two and we are pretty sure that Roberto is going to leave (somehow baseball related) and that Chris L and Frank will be the final two at the end. I really like Kirk, but from the preview it seems like he shares something from his past with Ali that she is not to thrilled about and I see him going until close to the end, but I don't think he will be one of the final two. Ty is the only other guy that I like and I think the rest will be eliminated sooner rather than later. The whole Kasey tattoo thing is crazy and I think he won't last much longer. We will be able to watch one more episode together before we all disperse for our summer plans....tear!

When the girls came over I was given these

 and these

(the kind with the ice cream cone on it is to DIE for!!!)

and this 

(raspberry cheesecake with graham cracker crust=AMAZING!)

I also got a book (for airplane reading!) and a giftcerfiticate to Starbucks which I used this afternoon on a grande soy latte! 

I have such sweet and thoughtful friends! 

After our show, we went to Zen for dinner, which is an awesome Thai place in town. We enjoyed some red curry, pad thai, some other chicken dish with veges, spring rolls, and chicken skewers with peanut sauce. 

DELISH!

It took us several tries (using the timer and my gorilla pod) to get this shot, but it is nice to have the picture of the four of us together.

The two lovely ladies on the right both lived at the same hotel as Mr. Sneaker and me when we first moved to Germany. They are both from Canada and work at my school.

The lovely lady on the left is my really great friend Jill who is also from OR and who will be moving back as well this summer. We celebrated her birthday last weekend in Prague.

It was so nice to spend a relaxing celebratory evening with friends and before we knew it, it was almost midnight!

Last year on this date, we flew to Germany for our "look-see" to determine whether or not we would accept the job offer at the global headquarters and move here. It was hard to wrap my mind around the idea of moving to another country and the trip was filled with lots of ups and downs. I remember sitting down on my birthday to write a letter to "Birthday Katie 2010."  I saved it on my computer and next weekend, I will read that letter, which is something I am looking forward to. I remember writing something about how right now (June 26, 2009) it seems so scary to think about the idea of moving, but that a year from now (June 26, 2010), I will probably laugh at how worried I was because I will have friends and a new life in Germany. 

I am happy to say that I was right and I did meet some amazing people that I am very thankful I have had the chance to get to know. I am so happy that I met these wonderful girls because they have made living in Germany a lot of fun and we have shared some great times together. My faux birthday was a blast and I had a wonderful time with the girls.