Lilies in the Valley: Happy Birthday Little Mama!

September 1, 2010

Happy Birthday Little Mama!

"Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb is His reward." Psalm 127:3

This past weekend we celebrated our youngest's third birthday. She is the "little mama" of our home and has earned this nickname for a variety of reasons. On any given day, any one of us may find ourselves being corrected by Little Mama. She's been known to stand in the living room, hands on both hips and say, "Who left these toys in the middle of the floor?" in a voice that sounds an awful lot like me. Or when the boys are being rowdy at bedtime she will tell them to turn off the light and get into bed. And the other night when I unknowingly interrupted someone at the dinner table (I didn't hear them speaking when I started talking), she told me, "You should say 'Excuse me' first when you want to say something," to which I replied, "Yes, Little Mama!"
Every evening after dinner when it's time for family Bible reading, Little Mama is the one who gets the Bibles. As soon as Dad opens up his MacBook (to read from his Accordance Bible program), she jumps up from the table to get the Bibles and distribute them to each of us. She's also a very good mama to her growing number of baby dolls--always careful to keep them warm, "read" them books, "nurse" them, hug them, and give them lots of kisses. And heaven help the person who drops one of her babies on the floor either by accident or on purpose.

So knowing our Little Mama, we went with a baby theme for her party. I baked a dish of Italian Chicken and Tom grilled cheeseburgers and hotdogs for the guest. On the side were sliced cucumbers in a sun dried tomato dressing and cooked apples which Nana brought to share. For dessert was the sour cream chocolate cake I baked and decorated earlier in the day. We had a wonderful meal and afterwards, Papa was kind enough to play "Happy Birthday to You" on the piano when the cake came out. At the end of the evening came the Birthday Speeches. Birthday Speeches are something we began doing this year and will keep as a tradition. Everyone attending the party must give a "speech" to the birthday person. They may simply tell what they love and/or appreciate about the birthday person, or share a kind memory, an encouragement from the Scriptures, or even a poem. It is a way of building up the birthday person, developing public speaking skills, and practicing the admonishment for the body of Christ in Hebrews 10:24 which says, "And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works."
To make it special, the birthday person sits in a chair at the front of the room and wears a cape and crown or tiara. Little Mama is so used to giving birthday speeches that she was terribly upset when I told her she wouldn't be giving one since it was her birthday. Not understanding, the tears began to roll just when the speeches were about to begin so we let her give her speech. She wiped her tears, stood in the middle of the room and told us all what she loves about her big brother (our youngest son)! (In case you were wondering, she loves that he lets her play board games with him). Then she sat back in the birthday chair and listened to the speeches meant for her. It was a lovely time in which we were giving thanks to the Lord for his gift of family.