my birthday

In all my adult life so far, I haven't celebrated my birthday. I mean, it's come and gone, but I haven't celebrated. Not because I don't want to get old, but because I didn't really think there was much worth celebrating. How arrogant of me! How could I scorn God's goodness to me by choosing to be grumpy about life. I must be finally maturing, even if only a little, because a small part of my selfishness died and I thanked God with deepest gratefulness for his blessings in my life.

And so I celebrated my birthday.

It started early in the morning when Jair showed me my birthday present - he'd made a netball court for me. He made hoops, painted the lines out with oil so that they court is marked. The court is grass, as is customary in the Solomons, but it serves its purpose well. We've had four games since the court was made last week and all our friends at SWIM who join have a blast running around, laughing and playing. It's so fun playing netball in the Solomons.

Then I got baking, with the new beater that my mum sent me for my birthday. I got it in July, but it, and allll the other presents she sent, are so cool. Thankfully a friend came by and helped with dishes and holding Theresa, who was being a bit troublesome. I think she knew something was up.

Then the party started. Again, I've never really in my adult life organised a party... although, regrettably, there are plenty of times when I should have, and when I was planning to. I'm an introvert though, so I don't throw parties. Except for last wednesday. I made two carrot cakes (I spoiled myself by buying cream cheese so I could make cream cheese icing... hmmm) and a huge bowl full of cookies and tonnes of litres of iced coffee. I invited all the people who work and live at SWIM and the guests in the Transit House and we all ate and drank and were merry.

Then after I washed all the cups, Jair, Theresa and I went out for lunch to my favourite western cafe. There's nothing quite like escaping into its cold, crisp environment to make you feel as if you've gone back to NZ. Alas, it's so expensive that it's only something that happens infrequently. But that made it all the more special.

My birthday dinner was on Thursday night. I invited a small group of close friends and we had a delicious dinner of cream cheese (again...) stuffed chicken breast, salads etc. I won't tell you what was for dessert because it involved an ingredient that is contraband here... then we played balderdash and had an absolute howl of a time!

The second best part of my birthday was that in the afternoon, I got a birthday parcel from my special friend Bianca. She had told me 20 days earlier that she had sent it and that it would arrive in 12 to 24 days, but I thought, knowing Solomon Post, add another two weeks. But it came impeccably on time - right on my birthday. Yay. Thanks sooo much to Bianca - it really made my day.

But the best part of my birthday was celebrating God's goodness to me. One of his gifts is my wonderful husband whose Godliness and love and wisdom astounds me daily, the second is my beautiful daughter - who is closer than any biological child ever could be.