We have just passed through our major birthday season. My three oldest children have birthdays that span about a three week time frame. I will post pictures at a later date. First we celebrated Alaina's fourth birthday. She was born on the 31st of May, claiming her own month (as did Zoe). For the first time in my parental career I made a cake that was pink with pink frosting, sprinkles and princesses to boot. Our little girl is truly a princess. Her presents were wrapped in pink paper. After receiving a pink sleeping bag it became her bed covers of choice. This thoughtful little person asked her grandma if she could get her puppy a bone as one of her presents.
Next we celebrated the birth of Milo. This little guy came into the world six years ago June 10th. After discussing cake options Milo stated he wanted a round cake. I have no round cake pans and so had to be creative. I used a deep pyrex dish and cooked that thing for a long time. His cake also was adorned with sprinkles but did not carry princesses. :) His mom and dad got him two Star Wars cookbooks and we received the reaction every parent, or person for that matter, wants when giving a gift.
Finally we celebrated Jasper. I cannot believe that eight years ago, June 19th, I had my first and now oldest child. He has been a blessing to my life, as all my kids have. This time the birthday cake was provided courtesy of Jasper and Milo's big brother Jordan. I could not have made a better cake for Jasper. This cake was a picture of a hippo coming out of the water with the statement, "Hippo-Hooray Jasper's 8 Today". He was lavished in bicycle gear and is now ready to ride the Tour de France ;).
As part of our "rule" to maintain sanity and order in our wee house (packed with six people and a large dog) when the kids get a new toy something of equal, larger or many items equaling have to go out. Sometimes this is challenging since we all like our toys. We have tried and continue to try to instill in our kids the idea that gifts are not the big idea. With birthdays we are celebrating the person, their birth and their life. Presents are a bonus. Same with Christmas. We are celebrating the life and birth of our Savior and Christ, presents are a bonus. I am finding that in this culture it is difficult to not only realize those truths but to be able to actively pursue them. In some ways we are a strange people because of this but I tell you for me it is absolutely freeing!
I am at this point in time going through my own stuff and our house to minimize as I sometimes feel overwhelmed by it all. I have to check my own desires to get more stuff and then find a place for it. I was convicted a couple weeks ago by the realization that while I was trying to get rid of stuff in the house my motive was not to have less stuff but to get different stuff. Wow. After that the urge to purge settled down a bit. It is pretty amazing how little we actually need and how easy it is to maintain, and clean, less stuff. So in closing I will say that I need to seriously lighten my laundry load. :)
I am blessed by all of you in my life. Thank you for reading my rants and for all the positive feedback you have all given me. I have about three more posts to write but for now they will rattle around in this little brain of mine.
