It was 5am and our 8-year-old daughter Noff came into our room. It was so dark I thought I was dreaming it.
“Do you know where Tsoof is?” she asked.
Tsoof is our 14-year-old son and shares a room with Noff. He never comes to our room so early in the morning.
I jumped out of bed with my heart pumping. Where on Earth could he be?
For a second, I imagined scenes from movies.
“Maybe he’s downstairs”, Gal said after searching every room upstairs and went down with Noff to solve the case of missing child.
It was early and dark and I sooooo wanted to go back to sleep, but when Gal came back from his search, I realized I had done it to myself.
“You told them we would get up early in the morning and prepare something for Eden’s Birthday”, Gal said. Eden, our oldest daughter, turned 21 yesterday and I had suggested we would post sticky notes all over the house to show her our love, but we could not do it at night, because Eden goes to sleep at the same time we do.
I had said “early”, but I had not meant THAT early…
I got out of bed again, realizing why my kids were so excited and could not sleep any longer. Tsoof was sitting at his computer fully dressed since 4:30am and trying to look for photos of Eden to print and hang around the house.
I took my most colorful sticky note pads and the four of us sat for half an hour and wrote our love and wishes for Eden. Then I took the notes and posted them all over the house.
Here are statements of lover and wishers from just some of the many colorful sticky:
- I love you
- You are so beautiful
- Happy birthday
- Have a year to remember
- Wow, you are so grown up
- Eden is cool
- You are the best sister in the world
- My happy thought
- Have a magical year
- Wishing you fun, fun, fun
- Our Dean Award winner (Eden made the Dean’s list last semester)
- You are so smart
- You hair and teeth are so beautiful
- Our Eden is 21 and we are so happy and proud
- You are playing the piano so well!
- May you meet lots of great new friends this year
- May you have another wonderful year
- Who da best? You da best!
We wrote many family jokes and there was so much love in the notes it was a challenge to keep the excitement quiet.
When we finished, I imagined myself going back to bed and convinced myself there was still time to celebrate, because Eden was born in the other side of the world at 6:30pm, which would be early the following morning, but the kids were so excited I knew I would not be able to sleep.
Noff just could not wait any longer, so she went to Eden’s room and woke her up. We all piled up on Eden’s bed and wished her a happy birthday, but Noff told her she needed to go downstairs and find all the love notes.
Most of the notes were easy to see, but I hid some in the microwave oven, in the fridge, in the oven, in her book and her bag, to give her extra surprised during the day.
Eden loves affirmations and quality time, so she was very happy to go around the house with Noff and find so many love notes. Although we thought she would take them down and keep them as souvenirs, she left them hanging there, so she could see them again when she came back in the afternoon. After 21 years of me talking about making every day a celebration and having birthdays for a whole month, I think she adopted the idea of extending the fun, the joy and the love for as long as possible.
At dinner time, I told everyone a story.
“21 years ago, on the 2nd of February at 6:30 pm, Eden was born. All the fairies came to celebrate with us. Each of the fairies gave her a blessing: to be healthy, beautiful, smart, friendly, flexible, adventurous, loving, lovable, knowledgeable, wealthy and happy. But the fairies could only give her the blessings. She is the one who needs to use them. My wish for Eden is that she will always know she is blessed and that she needs to use her blessings”, I said and I could see Eden and Tsoof’s smile with that “Mom just made that up” look.
Then Noff asked me, “Mom, do you believe in fairies?”
And Gal and Tsoof immediately clapped their hands and said, “One more fairy just died now”.
“No, fairies can never die, because they believe strongly in what they do. I if you doubt them, it makes them stronger and they do more magic to help you believe”, I said immediately.
Eden and Tsoof smiled knowingly again, but they said nothing.
And I thought that, although it was Eden’s Birthday, I was giving give all three of my kids at once the best gift I could give them – the belief they are great and their life holds unlimited promise. And you know what? I did not even have to wait for their birthday.
Fairy School
Tell your kids they were blessed at birth. Everyone starts life with infinite potential.
Remind yourself every day that as soon as your kids were born, you became their guardian fairy and that every birthday you go up a grade at the fairy school.
May glitters of love be spread all over your home,
Ronit
Hi Bill,
The initial fear of him disappearing actually happened to us too.
Tsoof, our 14 year old son was born after we lost two kids. He was born in the USA – California and while we lived there we have heard so many kidnapping stories it was scary.
When he was less then one year old, we lived in Thailand, Bangkok, we went into a big mall for shopping. . Eden( 7 years old) and I were trying on some clothes and Gal was playing with Tsoof peekaboo next to us. at one point he did not come out, it was just a few seconds. Gal said, I can’t find him and we started going around ( not even being able to speak Thai). It was the longest 5 minutes of our lives. I imagined the worst. People saw us screaming his name and running around and directed us to the entrance. a women who saw him running around by himself took him to the entrance where he sat there with a balloon and a lolly happy and smiling and 20 Thai people standing next to him and playing with him. I cried so much!
We lived 1.5 years in Thailand and the fear of him disappearing faded.
Thai people are so funny. Anywhere we went, they came to his pram, played with him, picked him up and went to show him off to their friends. At first I was so scared and defensive but later on, I learned that they mean no harm and I relaxed.
It is amazing, we have the same story.
I have three kids, he is the only kid that ever disappeared and it was the only time and hopefully the last.
Ronit
I can relate to our initial feeling of fear reminds me of the worst feeling I ever had in my life. We were shopping and my son who was about 4 was with us. As we were standing in a store looking at something, we took our eyes off him for 5 seconds. We turned around and he was gone – It was horrifying. Immediately we went to the security guards and they sent out an alert and puts guards instantly on every exit door. Eventually a nice lady came wandering up to us and could tell we were frantic. She said, are you looking for a young boy? He’s at the security station. I just dropped him off.
Thank god for people like her.
Thank you Debby.
I am so lucky to have my family. thank you!
It must be fun blogging with your daughters.
I read some of your blog, they are gorgeous. I could read the love between the lines. I tried to ask my 21 year old daughter to join me. She is now studying psychology and comes home with her learning that is fascinating. I think I will use your blog to encourage her to write too.
I like the idea of telling her how long the labor took and finish it with “you are worth it!”. kids growing up understanding it are special kids.
I was pregnant two and a half years before I had my son ( lost two kids on the way) and I tell him every chance I get that he was worth every second of the pain. He is a special kid.
Thank you Debby from my wonderful family to your wonderful family.
hugs
Ronit
Loved this post. Your family is wonderful and truly blessed by fairies or whomever else creates such a loving and compassionate unit. I blog with my three daughters who are all grown. Each year on March 28, I write to my oldest and remind her that many years ago on that date, I went into labor. As her birthday is March 30, she is annually reminded of just how long it took! I tell her every year that she was worth the wait.