Birthday Party

Tonight we had my birthday celebration, organized by my loving wife. The 2 mystery guests she invited were our friends Charles and Magalie. We've covered a lot of ground relationally with them over the last 3 years, so it was great to be with them.

My wife wanted the evening to be like one at a restaurant and she succeeded, with a menu of appetizers, olives, steak, potatoes, green beans, and a 1995 vintage bottle of French coca cola.

Our friends brought the birthday cake. On my first attempt at blowing out 4 candles on the cake, I only succeeded in blowing out one! Pretty sad.

One reason why I enjoyed this birthday so much was having our 2 kids around. They add so much life to our household and help keep this old codger younger in spirit than I might have been otherwise. My son and I went to his swim group before the party and he made more progress kicking around in the water. We also had a session today where I would throw both our kids onto our bed. All involved in this game love it.

Charles asked if I had any new projects on the horizon for this year. All I could think of was the addition of our next daughter this coming February. We're already excited about adding her to the family constellation. My wife said that our daughter kissed her tummy today, as she seems to understand that my wife is carrying some life.

I think that my bottom line project of this year is to help bring new life into the family. This includes my physical family, as well as the Church family at Belleville, as well as in other places. The new life may come in as physical babies who are lovable, but basically helpless, young people with lots of ideas and energy, artists with lots of creativity, interns with lots of good will and service, and those on the margin or completely outside of the community of the Christian faith.