"30 in 30 on 30"

Last month my wonderful Husband turned 30 on 30th June and I quite literally planned out the entire month for his birthday. Right from the 1st day on Saturday, Queen's Birthday weekend.

We took a wee drive south to Peel Forest, which is a wee village outside of Geraldine. Literally there is just the forest for taking walks, a cafe/dairy & a school. I packed together a picnic lunch, after finding a picnic blanket with the Union Jack on it, which was way cool. Simon's comment when he saw it was "they could see it from space". We enjoyed our picnic lunch in direct line with the sunshine, despite the cold. It was a fantastic day.

I also promised to make his sandwiches for work each day and to take the bins out each week for the duration of the month.

June - entirely planned out.

I decided o do this from about mid-April and spent May planning it out and finalising it, right down to mini lists for each of the more adventurous days/evenings.

The days that followed involved little gifts and on the 10th & 20th something more. Little gifts included Yorkie Bars, Double Deckers, cans of Dr Pepper, Sherbert. I made dinner a couple of times (which in our house is a rarity as Simon cooks dinner most nights - I'm not really a cooker). The first night I cooked on Tuesday 4th was Lasagne with salad & homemade garlic bread. I put the salad in ramekins to make it look a little more exciting and lit candles round the kitchen & lounge.

Gift Card - homemade

With each event or gift it came with either a gift tag tied/hung round it or a gift card, which would say a little message, explain out the event of allude to the evening's plans.

Gift Tags decorated & written out

I took Simon out for dinner & movies, up to Victoria Park for Ice Cream (though it was raining that night so we parked up to enjoy the view of our city at night). A couple of times I went out & got Moro Bar Cheesecake from Coffee Culture (which if you are local and haven't tried it, you must, it is melt-in-your-mouth amazing).

Simon had mentioned, that if he did do something for his birthday to celebrate, that he'd have a dinner at Styx & Stone at Northwood. So I organised that too, while he knew about it & chose the guest list & agreed to the invitations, I sent him an invite too. We held this on the Friday night before his birthday. It was a lovely meal with family & close friends. I also had a cake sorted too (from Divine Cakes of course). A chocolate mud cake with "Happy Birthday Simon" iced on it, with "30" number candles. It was absolutely delicious.

Simon's own personal invite to dinner :)

On the Saturday I took Simon over to Akaroa for the night. We stayed at the holiday park up on the hill & had a great view of the harbour, through the trees. We arrived mid-afternoon so enjoyed a relaxing earl evening, followed by pizza & chips at L'Hotel down by the water. Even in the middle of winter Akaroa is amazing. I feel we can never stay long enough (have decided we'll definitely have to purchase property there & as soon as possible). We walked out onto the wharf afterwards, pitch blackness + freezing cold, while wrapped up warm was just lovely.

The next day "B-DAY" Simon was 30....

After checking out, we strolled around the area, drove along further round the peninsula to where the marae is situated. Then parked up by the lighthouse & walked along beside the bay. It was such a lovely, mild winter's day.

Akaroa Lighthouse

My Father, Step-Mom & Brother happened to pop over to enjoy lunch with us (I'd arranged this of course). We had lunch at "Bully Hayes" - the Monteith's Bar there, which is just another example of how excellent these bars are to dine at.

View of the Bay from our Accommodation

The presents: well Simon was well & truly spoilt this birthday. He ended up with 5 bottle of whiskey, all different, both Irish & Scottish. I bought him a Seiko watch & had it engraved. Having received some pounds we finally purchased the James Bond 50th Anniversary book set of all the movies on Blu Ray from Amazon, which once we'd received was definitely worth getting. So now we'll start watching them from Dr. No all through to Skyfall.

One of the other great presents he received as the 30th Anniversary edition of Pink Floyd's 'Dark Side of the Moon' on vinyl.

Overall it was a fantastic birthday & I know Simon really enjoyed it all. I thoroughly enjoyed planning & executing out everything for his big birthday.