a good day

I can't tell you how much I appreciate all of the support I received from this community last week.  It feels so good to have other people acknowledge Nate's birthday and offer prayers to my family.  There were very few people that acknowledged it outside of the blogging world so I appreciated it even more.

Saturday ended up being a good day. 

We laughed. 

We cried. 

We survived.
  

That's all I can ask for.

 

Our first stop was to have lunch at our local McDonald's.  We've done this the past 2 years to commemorate the month that we spent at the Ronald McDonald House.  We even let the twins get Happy Meals (a rarity) since a portion of the cost is donated to help other families like ours.

Then we stopped by the party store on our way to Disneyland.  We let everyone pick out a special balloon and we all wrote him a special birthday note that we attached to the balloons.

Kaylee did both sides.

Then we gathered around his brick to sing Happy Birthday and do our balloon release.  Typically I have to ask a stranger passing by to take photos for us.  But this year, a kind mom stopped by our little celebration and asked if we wanted her to take pictures for us.  She was so incredibly sweet.  It was such a nice blessing. 

We huddled together and sang a very tearful Happy Birthday to our little man.  I just love this shot that she took because you can read his brick right in the middle of our circle.

Then we let our balloons go and watched them float away.

It was a warm and beautiful BLUE SKY day.  Thank you God for that little blessing. 

It's always so emotional watching our balloons float away. 

The twins wanted to have a birthday cake for him so I snuck one into the park (can you believe they weren't going to let us bring it in?) and we sat down in the middle of Fantasyland for a little party.

Then we enjoyed our afternoon at the park.  It was unusually crowded.  Actually it was packed!  We didn't get on many rides but we had fun anyway.

We always get our kids a Disney "Birthday Button" when it's their birthday so we got one for Nate too.  My husband wore it all day long and loved it when the Disney employees would walk by and say "Happy Birthday Nathan".  The kids and I wore "I'm Celebrating" buttons to make the day extra special. 

After a long debate about where to eat dinner (a hard, emotional day for the kids), we decided to eat at Downtown Disney.

We finished off the night by letting the kids each pick out their own Disney balloon to take home (a very special treat that is only given on Nate's birthday).

And the night was finished off perfectly with the most amazing fireworks display!

I just love this picture with the fireworks going off behind the kids' balloons. 

Though it is still the month of March and I find myself reliving the days that we spent in the hospital with Nathan, I am relieved that his birthday is over.  Upon reflection, we realized that we spent the day in a way that honored our son and was right for our family.  I just wish that I didn't get bummed about all of  the people that didn't remember his birthday or acknowledge how hard this month is for us.  Maybe next year that won't matter. 

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All of my other kids have a birthday banner that we hang at their party every year. So Shayna and I decided that we wanted to make one for Nate last week. She helped me pick out fabric, cut out letters and sew it all together. I was thankful to share that experience with her. We both enjoyed doing something special for Nathan. We dragged that banner around with us the entire day. The inconvenience of it was far outweighed by the blessing it gave us.