twenty-four.

you'd think i'd feel completely "adult," being married and a college graduate and a business owner and having recently taken on a big city and all. i mean, all of that is completely adult, right? 

well, i'll fill you in on a little secret. sometimes (read: at least fifty percent of the time), i'm still convinced i'm sixteen. 

so when my birthday rolled around yesterday, and suddenly i had the number "24" attached to me... it was kinda like whaaaa?! scary and awesome and all sorts of relatively "adult" sounding. 

i'm sure i'll look back to this in a few years and laugh at myself, but whatever... it's all part of the growing up process, right?

my birthday was really, really super low-key this year. it was my long day of school for the week (over nine hours of class straight); plus i had a killer exam (which also conveniently was my 4th out of 5 for the week). 

so running on four hours of sleep (dang studying!), i celebrated the day with a diet coke, some celebratory wishes and singing from kind classmates, and allowing my mind to wander a bit more than normal in classes. 

i came home from school to some of the sweetest surprises from my mateo! he had cleaned the apartment, called his mom to learn how to make me a surprise peruvian dish for dinner, and baked me a gluten-free cake. so cute. 

we spent the evening noshing on all sorts of goodies, opening a few gifts (my parents and mateo know me so well. how'd i get so lucky?!), and relaxing. 

i love birthdays in general because i feel like it's the best opportunity to let people know how much they're loved. and i certainly felt loved on my 24th. the first "happy birthday!" i received came at 12:30 from a dear friend living allll the way in india for the summer, and i was so excited to hear from so many of the sweet people who have touched my life over the years. 

i'm exceptionally grateful for mateo this birthday. he ran around the house singing made up birthday songs and worked so hard to make my day special. my last birthday, we were apart. recently engaged, he was living in peru and waiting for his visa, and i was in the united states, waiting for him. i was missing him and all of my bebes in peru super badly. 

so he put together this sweet video for me and consequently made me cry. at the end of the video, he promises that we'll be together on my birthday next year...

... and i'm incredibly grateful that we were.