My mom always told me as you get older you get less excited for your birthday. As a kid I never believed her. I was always excited for the next milestone. 10, 13, 16, each time I reached a new age it’s like I expected my life to instantly be different. But this year as my birthday was approaching, I felt more anxious about what was going to happen, because I knew my life would be extremely different. I was going to be with people I barely knew, in a city I could hardly envision. My focus was less on my birthday, and more on the different changes that would be going on in my life.

But as I started adjusting to my new environment and making new friends, I realized that this year my birthday would be whatever I decided to make it. When else would I be able to say I celebrated my birthday in London!? I could barely believe it.

I’ve never been much of a planner, but I decided this year I was going to make sure this birthday was memorable. But it ended up being better than I could EVER imagine.

I decided that my birthday would be a two day celebration. Thursday we would all go out, and Friday, we would have a girl’s night. I mean why not?? My last day of school was a Thursday, and I had to go to a mandatory field trip on Friday afternoon (my actual birthday.) I was about to have a complete birthday experience.

Thursday we decided to go to a nearby bar, and then go to a pub/bar/dance club.  But like I said- I’ve never been much of a planner. After taking the tube to go across London we finally ended up finding the pub we had been looking for. But when we got there, we realized that that there was actually no dance floor. FALSE ADVERTISEMENT.

After walking down random blocks for about 30 minutes we finally found what seemed to be a decent club without a guest list. Which in London, is very hard to find. Especially when you’re with guys.

This is where I realized that the British dance A LOT differently than Americans. For a good hour, My friends and I were under the impression we were in a gay club. Because if we had been back in the states, guys would already be trying to grab us from behind.  In the US, if I guy isn’t dancing with a girl, he will just hang out on the outskirts until he finds one. But here, guys had no problem dancing with each other.

But in  reality, the British are just a lot less explicit than Americans. I didn’t see girls bent over in a 90 degree angle, or guys touching girls in places they shouldn’t be. Which was quite refreshing.  Here guys will twirl you, dance with you face to face, or GASP! Have a conversation with you.

Me and my friend met some new friends who brought us to the VIP section:

And I had a great time dancing the night away:

But Friday was an EXPERIENCE. After staying out late Thursday night, and having to wake up at 8 am to go to the Salisbury Cathedral and Stonehenge. I was exhausted. But as my official birthday, and last day of celebration, a girls gotta do what a girl’s gotta do 😉

Salisbury Cathedral:

Earlier that week I made reservations to one of the most famous clubs in London.  Apparently a One Direction member celebrated their birthday there a week prior, so the place was getting a lot of press. I was going with about 15 other girls, so I knew we were going to have a good time. But it ended up WAY better than I could imagine!

We walked up to the club and got the ultimate VIP treatment. The manager of the club took us to the front of the line, and sat us at a table where we received table service, and three rounds of drinks for all sixteen of us. Did I mention this was all FREE!? We didn’t even pay to get in, and I couldn’t even tell you what the bar looked like, because we never had to go up to it.

Of course, I had to take a birthday night pic 😉

Some of the girls:

This was the best birthday I have ever had, because it was totally unexpected. I still cannot believe this is the life I’m living, and I am cherishing every moment of it. But now I have a new problem. How will my 20^th even come close to my 19^th? Luckily I’m just going to focus on the present 🙂