birthday traditions and Isaac's day and a bit of a plea......

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Isaac doesn't read my blog so I'm safe posting this....for now.  I am realizing I do not have many pictures of my big boys......I need to make a plan to fix that.  Maybe that plan involves a better camera and more focus on making them stop and pose for me.....because these days and years are so incredibly precious I can barely stand it.  Isaac is 14 today.  Today is his birthday.  I love how we do birthdays in this family......if it is your birthday,in this house, we celebrate you.  

I find out what you want for gifts and then Roger and I discuss what is possible, probably and "no-freakin' way"......for a few weeks.  Then Roger purchases the "big" gift.  This year, Isaac gets his own laptop because he needs one anyway in the fall for high school and at the school he plans to attend, you purchase and provide your own.  We let him pick out something with a few bells and whistles since it was his gift.  Next, the birthday child and I plan the birthday.  Every other year they get a party and the off-year we just do a family thing.  This year was Isaac's family thing.  We plan the food and the day and if it's your birthday, in this family, we all celebrate YOU all day long.  

Isaac chose a typical breakfast (egg, ham and cheese on bagel) before church.  After Sunday school, we traveled to Sioux City to have lunch at Isaac's restaurant choice which was a Japanese hibachi grill and sushi bar.  Its a fun place where they cook in front of you with flame and tricks and the chef interacts.....we don't frequent these types of eateries.......in fact, after we tried not to gulp at the bill the waitress provided us, we tipped her well cuz she was great (and then realized when we got home that the gratuity was figured into the total since we were a party of 8).....with a $20......so, yeah.  We either need to go to fine dining places more or less often. ( Jeesh.  )
The kids like to buy each other birthday gifts as well, so he also got an xbox game, and some other small stuff......and we have indulged him and celebrated him and loved him and been attentive to Isaac all day today.  Tomorrow, he falls back in line as number 2 of 5....plus Grace.  Today, its his day.  

We praise God and thank Him today for Isaac.  He is important.  He is smart.  He is good.  He has a destiny ordained by God Almighty.  It is our job, as his family, to help him get there.  I love birthdays in our home.  It is sanctity-of-life day every time.  counting Grace, we get to celebrate 8 times a year.  Everyone waits and longs for and can't wait for their birthday here.  

We are not fancy people.  We don't have fancy lives.  I hope when each of our children grow up and move on that they take our family birthday traditions into their own homes because they are good, and worthy, and fun.  

Statistics vary regarding the numbers of children in foster care in the US who will not return to their family of origin, and globally, the number of orphan and unparented children is staggering......and these are millions of millions of children who likely don't have a birthday every year to celebrate the fact that they are alive.....and remember the day of their birth.  In the middle of my abundant love and thankfulness for Isaac, I am thinking of those children that no one is celebrating this year.  

If you are reading, and if this grips your heart even a little bit......please help someone adopt a child, foster a child, support a child in an orphanage.....or cowboy up yourself. 



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