Just days after Christmas, we celebrated Oak’s third birthday! He’s three! And he’s ours. I’m still relishing in each thing we get to do with him: the meals we get to have, the books we get to read, the birthdays we get to celebrate…and the dinosaur pancakes we get to make!
A few weeks before his birthday, his social worker at the children’s home asked for our address to send him a birthday package. A group of those that loved him so much and took such good care of him then–still are! They put together the sweetest box of balloons, locally made items, and a remote-control car!
We had a birthday party planned for the afternoon, but we asked Oak what he’d like to do for the day. His request was to see Yaminoo. {I know, buddy–we love her, too!} He also asked for chicken and ice cream, so we went off to Tesco for KFC and Dairy Queen with Yaminoo!
And, y’know those rides that kids ask for every time at the store, and you just keep saying “not today”? Well, birthdays = YES TODAY.
So we rode a few rides. And Yaminoo and I played air hockey, a personal favorite.
Then we headed home to prepare for a birthday party!
We invited a combination of kids from our neighborhood and the expat community that Oak knows, but we tried to stick to his age group and a smallish group of friends (a difficult task in our community, where everyone brings along a sibling or tells their friends to come get free cake). I did love making a little invitation for him to give out to his friends, and particularly seeing his multilingual little life already happening right before our eyes.
It was every bit as chaotic as we thought it might be, attempting to host fifteen or so kids in multiple languages.
It was also every bit as great as we could have imagined.
We bought the dinosaur shaped cake, we hosted the party.
We got to do all the things we’ve been waiting for.
We got to hold the toddler we’ve been waiting for!
May there be many, many more!