Birthday Getaway :)

K Rex and I took a lil time away from work to celebrate my birthday and just have a small getaway. He planned us a trip up to Cincinnati. Cincy is special to us because we had one of our very first dates there and always sneak up there for good dinning and shopping on occasion. My brother came down and kept the doggies and we headed up I-75 ...destination Cincinnati Zoo early morning on my actual birthday.  The zoo was an epic fail due to the gloomy miserable, rainy, cold weather :( YUCK!!!

Rainy weather put a minor snag in our plans

We tried to wait it out...but the raindrops kept on coming

Not happy camper number one

Not happy camper number two

So, the rain slacked a little and I decided to be a trooper. We had a  target bag on hand that i used to keep my new do from getting soaked. We tried running into the zoo, but alas the rain would simply not stop and mr. lighting and mr. thunder decided to join in. Kev immediately had a solution for this girl....food and SHOPPING. We pigged out  had enough lunch for a small army at Maggianos, an Italian restaurant that makes my mouth water just thinking about it. Their gnocchi is the bomb diggity!!!! After lunch, I unbuttoned the top button to my jeggings, and set out for a little retail therapy. Kevin Rex is not a shopper at all, but he will painfully play along with me for a couple of hours. For my birthday he let me tear up the Chanel counter and I also just happened to go a little crazy pick up a few things at Sephora. Major SCORE! I am loving all my new makeup and girly products. I will post about my great finds later :)

After shopping, we went back to the hotel for a quick napsie. We woke up and got ready for dinner at the Cheesecake Factory. It was my only request for my birthday that we ate there. It may sound cheesy (no pun intended) but it is my favorite place to eat with in Cincy. We always make it a point to go there when we are in Cincy for whatever reason. The first time we went there it was very early on in our relationship. I remember sitting there at our lil booth sipping on a mojito and thinking "i am really into this guy." It was the first time we both really connected and I knew we could have something. It is our ritual to always have a mojito every time we go there. I love the little memories in the early stages of relationships.  (added 7.21.11 post breakup - i have wanted to delete this paragraph so many times, but i have decided this was real when i wrote it and although i may not feel this way now, it was my honest feelings at that point in my life. oh, to live and to learn. i want my blog to be REAL and thus i opted not to hit the delete button)
A couple photos before dinner...I desperately need a new camera and a tripod. Maybe Santa will hook a girl up.

Corn fritters for appetizers...so yummy

We finished our meal with caramel apple cheesecake and peanut butter with Reese's cup cheesecake. We were stuffed!!!!

We got a photo snapped after dinner...and of course had to to have a to-go baggie.

The next day we decided to take the Zoo on for round 2. The weatherman was much more cooperative and we had GORGEOUS weather.

Hello SUNSHINE!

Two thumbs up for the awesome weather for our adventure to the zoo.

I ADORE animals and I was like a little kid wondering around the zoo. Here are a couple of the pics we snapped during the day.

This Gorilla, Jomo, was huge...like literally 8 foot tall.

The Polar Bears were one of our favorite attractions. We got to watch an actual feeding and they were quite the entertaining little fellers.

I loved my birthday and I am so blessed to be surrounded by so much love from family and friends. It was a great birthday indeed.