On Turning 37

"In three years you'll be forty and you'll have three half-grown boys by then. Then you can start to enjoy yourself again." Not quite the uplifting talk I was expecting when I was at the end of my tether with my young children recently. 

Tomorrow is my birthday and I will turn 37. While looking back over past birthdays the other day, I found that I remember the sevens the best.

For my 7th birthday my dad brought me out for lunch, bought me a bunch of daffodils and, most exciting of all, a Twinkle magazine. I felt very much the grown up little lady that day.

My 17th birthday was eventful, but made memorable by some horrible reasons. My mother was taken into hospital the day before and, to make matters worse, all of my school friends forgot my birthday. I visited the Turner watercolours in the National Gallery in Dublin alone and went out that night to someone else's 18th birthday party. 

The good times returned for my 27th birthday. The night before my birthday The Bavarian and I got engaged. You can't get much better than waking up on your birthday knowing that very exciting times are beginning. 

So what lies in wait for me tomorrow, I wonder? With the buzz of engangement, marriage and childbirth behind me now, I don't reckon with anything spectacular. And I would rather that no-one gets sick or forgets me. 

I'd be happy with a grown-up version of my 7th birthday, swapping the Twinkle magazing for something else twinkly.