Ever since leaving for Hawaii over three weeks ago, life hasn't slowed down. I've gone through some big changes at work, which have meant a huge increase in work load. That should all quiet down now, but these past few weeks have been intense. After the Dominican Republic home build, I spent about a week in Stone Mountain, GA. During that time, I celebrated my 36th birthday.

As a kid, I was a huge birthday person. I think this is part of being a December birthday. No one wants to celebrate your birthday. It's another gift, another event, just another something during a crazy month. That was a huge frustration as a child. My birthday always felt like a chore and like all little kids, I wanted to be celebrated and spoiled with gifts, cakes and parties.

As an adult, I get it. I have so much going on, I barely want to celebrate my birthday. If I could, I would probably let everyone forget it, especially when surrounded exclusively by coworkers. The last time I spent my birthday at training camp was four years ago and it actually was my first day working for the team. That meant I wasn't friends with anyone on social media and no one really knew me. I skated through without a single happy birthday and that was fine.

My birthday fell on one of the busiest days of training camp (media training) and was two days before maybe my biggest day of the year (media day/team presentation). I wanted to cruise through the day without anyone mentioning it, but thanks to Facebook reminders, everyone knew. And after living, working and traveling together so closely for this many years, no one was letting me skate by.

And they did a great job spoiling me: I received a cake, tiara, flowers, balloons and a great meal out. I felt loved and celebrated. A few special people lead the charge and made sure I felt spoiled all day long. It was nice. And when you work with so many Italians, you realize all those great birthday kisses aren't such a bad thing.