birthday celebrations.

It’s pretty fun to celebrate your birthday in the States.

In Mae Sot, we really do try. Stephen really goes out of his way to find ways to make birthdays special, because I particularly love birthdays. Other Partners staff and friends work really hard to do something special and find fun little presents, but to be honest, it’s just not home. The cake isn’t as good, the presents are usually a little obscure.

But this year, we celebrated. Five times, in fact; and we have photos from just a few of them.

On my birthday, we were in Gatlinburg with Stephen’s family, and one of the places I have always wanted to visit in Gatlinburg is the Salt & Pepper Shaker Museum.

When I joined his family in the Smokies for the first time about six years ago, Stephen and I drove up to meet them. We passed a sign for the museum, to which I  commented how fun that was and that we should go. The very next day, while in the car with his family, someone commented on what a weird idea that was and asked who would ever go there.

Being very new to the family, I remained silent and gave Stephen a glare to do the same. But this year, I’ve been there long enough and we went for my birthday!

And yes, they do boast  to be the only–and largest–salt & pepper shaker museum in the world. And while this may bore you, I will be posting a selection of photos. I loved it.

Who knew that the owl collection would be this expansive?!

We liked the clocks in the background.

The Christmas Collection

The largest and smallest in their collection. The smallest are earrings.

We really liked the blue ones in the middle.

They had a map to mark where you came from. It was only a map of the US, though, so we joined a few others and wrote in our lovely town of Mae Sot.

We celebrated that night with Mellow Mushroom pizza in downtown Gatlinburg.

Stephen & I also went out on a birthday date once we were back in town, and celebrated with my family and a surprise party with friends.