Tag: birthday

Past Birthdays

August 23 was Vlad’s and Anna’s 34th birthday, and I had plans to publish a historical post about this actual date (I already have one on my timeline, but without many details). However, I had too much life for a lengthy historical post (it might come at some point in the future, maybe next year when they will be 35 :)).

For the past month, I tried to arrange Vlad’s visit to Chicago, which is as challenging as you could imagine, given his work schedule and his ambitions. I am very thankful that he was able to make it, even though it was for less than 24 hours. Boris and I haven’t seen him for over a year, so I tried to make it happen when Boris is here. When we were discussing the schedule, I said that any day except for Tuesday would work, and of course, the only day Vlad could make was Tuesday!

Anyway, we met for an early dinner at the Gage to celebrate Boris’ 75th and their 34th birthdays, and I presented the T-shirts designed by Boris for the occasion:

Tallinn: Afternoon Activities

We went to the Estonian National Opera to hear an unlikely “My Fair Lady” in Estonian. The alternative would be to go there on another day, but it was way better to go on the actual birthday. Also, since today is a US holiday, I didn’t have to work, so we could plan a no-rush return to Helsinki.

There are several photos and videos on the Opera website, but almost all of them are with different artists than the ones we heard yesterday (the ones below look like the right ones :))

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Tallinn

At the ferry terminal
Still Christmas at the terminal
On the ferry
Arriving to Tallinn
A view from our room at the My City Hotel

After our last time experience with a Medieval hotel we decided on slightly more modern option and chose My City Hotel which is located in a 20th century building and decorated in the 18th century style. We loved it.

At reception they asked me whether it was my birthday, and presented mw with a cute little box of local chocolate:

The room had a normal desk, which is a rarity as we found the hard way 🙂

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Pre-birthday

My economy premium was completely useless because, as I mentioned, I skipped dinner in favor of longer sleep and could not sleep because of the pain. There was no breakfast in the morning because the arrival time was lunchtime, so there was just a sandwich (and who cares about a sandwich!) Enough about misery. I arrived on time, with no lines at the border control and no questions about protein powder in my luggage.

It was sunny and way warmer than in Chicago. We went to Kmarket to get some food, and Boris said we should get some ice cream, which we unwrapped right after we exited the store and ate while walking home. I chose a Geisha cone, and it had the whole geisha candy inside 🙂

At home, we had salad and runebergs, and I went straight to bed to compensate for a sleepless night.

I slept for 11 hours straight (Boris didn’t believe me when I told him that’s what I needed, but I actually slept from 7-30 PM to 6-30 AM). I am still a little bit lightheaded, but now I think I will survive the day of adventures.

Mom’s Birthday Celebration

Everything went great, even with all the things I mentioned yesterday, plus today’s problems on the Red Line that made Igor and my mom being 30 minutes late to her party, and some guests as well :). There were a couple of times in the past when my mom got really upset about us not letting her know in advance that somebody was going to visit, that’s why we tried to plan it being a surprise, but not a complete surprise :).

I invited those with whom my mom interacted through all these seven years she has been in the USA, with the hope that she will remember. I was pleasantly surprised that she recognized everyone and addressed everyone by name, even those she hadn’t seen for a long time. About half an hour later, however, she started to ask me again who was who and how she knew them. When I shared this observation with Anna and John, they suggested that she got tired, and they must be right. I am going to focus on the positive side of things 🙂

Everyone whom I asked came, and the food was delicious, and Vanille’s cake was awesome.

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Mom’s Birthday

My mom turned 90 today. We are giving her a “semi-surprise party” tomorrow, and we have already had enough of disasters: Vlad couldn’t come because the earlier snowstorm in DC pushed the training he had to conduct to the weekend; both Anna and I had a work crisis (and Igor was super busy, too). We had to move to another venue two days before the party. Anna forgot the frame for our collective present at home; all the printing is done not at the last minute but one after the last, and so on.

After disassembling my Christmas tree, I realized I needed new boxes for ornaments. I ordered them, and they arrived, but I didn’t have time even to unpack them until today, so i was repacking ornaments when Anna’s family arrived.

BTW the boxes are great, and I feel like I always feel when I replace something old with a newer model – why didn’t I do it earlier?! It’s so much better!

Igor’s Birthday

Today was Igor’s birthday, and obviously because of the situation with my mom, our minds were not 100% on the celebration. I am glad that mom was well enough to go to the Chayhana cafe. I can’t judge their Middle asian food, but Russian dishes exceeded expectations (desserts could be better though).

it was not an easy year for Igor, and I am glad that he feels good about where he is now. Proud of his accomplishments and of his personal growth 🙂

The Rest Of The Weekend

There were tons of things we could do and wanted to do over this weekend, but it was not even remotely possible to fit everything in, so I suggested a couple revisions to our plans to make sure we do what’s most important for us and not rush. We ended up doing only two things today: the beach and Aquarium. Both Anna and I felt we didn’t do enough beach time on Saturday (partially because both she and I had to take calls), and Annd hardly had any beach time this summer, so we decided to skip the market and all other potential morning activities and to spend more time at the beach. Then, we took an Uber to the Aquarium and left all the luggage in a locker.

For her birthday, I gave Anna a Beluga encounter experience at the Aquarium, which ended up being a two-hour thing, and Anna said it was “one of the best things she had ever done.” (Now I want to do it myself!)

Now, Actually Today!

I just realized I didn’t hit “publish” on yesterday’s post. And I know why I didn’t – I wanted to add that for the third year in a row, on Vlad and Anna’s birthday, I think not about the last Russian revolution which was happening when they were born, but about Ukraine Independence Day, and the war, and about everything my generation didn’t do back then. Then I decided that I would write a separate post about it, and then I didn’t press “Post.”

The birthday was yesterday. Today, we just did things together: we went to the beach, had a post-birthday lunch, and then went to Chalk Howard, decorated our square and looked at how others decorated their’s.

The number of people on the beach was insane:

I was glad that we camped in the part which is usually less crowded because there are small rocks in the water. We had a great time and a lot of space around us. And Chalk Howard was a blast, as always.

Our square – I think next year I will buy two or three squares to accommodate all the art our family can create:)
Anna reads Igor’s birthday card

Today

Today, my twins turned thirty-three, and I have no idea when it happened 🙂 I even checked my calculation several times to ensure I was right!

Every year, on the day they are born, I tell myself and the rest of the world that having them was the best decision I ever made. Their presence in my life drove many of my decisions, which would have been drastically different otherwise.

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This week, I listened to “Moral Decision Making,” one of the Audible Great courses. Once again, the lecturer explained that what Boris and I did thirty-six years ago was completely and unquestionably morally wrong—not like I didn’t know it before. But that was the best thing that happened to both him and me. Not only because there won’t be Vlad and Anna otherwise but also because even thirty-six years later, I smile each time I think about him, and he smiles each time he thinks about me. And this is the most impossible thing in the world, which never happens :).

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