My birthday month is drawing to a close, and I’m thinking about all the Birthday Happy I’ve experienced. The gifts included things I need, like a box of lovely note cards from a dear friend, and things I don’t, like some new Kendra Scott pieces (gift to self) and a generously loaded Starbucks gift card from my husband, who thinks Starbucks coffee is no better than 7-11 coffee and believes those of us who pay $4 for a specialty beverage have been totally brainwashed.

One of my fave gifts came from my son, who gave me the gift of his time in joining us for dinner and also a new Shady Grove T-shirt – he knows what I like 🙂 A very special surprise came from my wonderful, much beloved siblings. The local one conspired with the out of town ones and they all showed up at dinner to surprise me. I’ve never had a surprise party and I was completely, thoroughly clueless that it was happening. So much so that when my husband, son and I got to the restaurant which was over crowded because of the band that was scheduled, I told my sister as soon as she arrived that we needed to go somewhere else, that I didn’t want to wait that long to eat. I could not for the life of me figure out why she was reluctant to leave – it was my birthday after all – and why she had invited her dance community friends Johnny and Sally to join us, or why it was so important that she reach them before we left to tell them of our change in plans. Of course “Johnny and Sally” turned out to be my other sister and brother, who by now were in line to get in at the restaurant after having driven 2 hours through rush hour traffic just to get there. In the end it all worked out beautifully – they surprised the heck out of me, we walked a couple of doors down to another restaurant and had a nice meal with a different live band and a not-very-good waitress. I even got a Happy Birthday balloon 🙂

Other gifts this month included things I did to prepare for others. It really is a gift to myself when I make preparations to bake a daughter’s favorite homemade birthday cake for her upcoming visit, or get our outside porches power washed, cleared and ready for a week of grandkid fun on their annual visit. And there is the gift of the feeling of accomplishment when working on our home, trying to maintain and take the best care of our lovely house which, like us, is old but has lots of character and needs lots of maintenance.

I also received the gifts of resting and reading for pleasure, two of my favorite things that often go neglected because there aren’t enough hours in the day.

But I suppose the best gift of all is the amount of love I have in my life – from others and for others, all bathed in the constant, never failing love of Christ. And hearing that name brings me to the ultimate gift, the gift of eternal life in Heaven with Jesus, and knowing that the love I experience on earth doesn’t hold a candle to His sacrificial love for me.

Candle. Cake. Balloon. Birthday Happy.