We planned the details of Josh's birthday party for several weeks. However, it did not go off the way we planned.
Josh wanted as many kids as possible to come to his party ... which was to be held at the same park where we had his last two parties ... so they could play all the football, basketball and baseball they liked.
One of his nurses had recruited Pizza Hut and Starbucks to help supply the food and drink.
We picked up the decorations. And we had several offers of folding tables to use to set up everything at the park. Invitations were out and we even set it up as an event to invite friends on facebook to come. It was all coming together and Josh was super excited.
BUT .........mother nature did not play along. We were watching the weather forecast and the sky as the time neared to go out and set up at the park. At one point, it said there was a 100 percent chance of rain for the time of the party and the next hour. And it started pouring before we could even get out the door to start toward the park. So, we contacted everybody we could and let them know we would change the location and have the party here at the house instead. Josh was not happy to have to ditch the park and all the sports he was ready to play with his friends.
My sister and I worked relentlessly to get the house ready for a party that we had not planned to have here... and just in time, it looked like we had planned to have it here all along.
We picked up the coffee, etc. from Starbucks (a huge container full with a sleeve of cups, lids and all the different sweeteners you can imagine plus a half gallon of half n half).
Another of Josh's nurses arrived and brought with her a very large, beautiful birthday cake she had worked on for hours for him.
Then, the guys from Pizza Hut popped in to unload several large pizzas, tins of pastas, breadsticks, sodas, plates, cups, etc.
And our guests got here despite the downpours outside. Josh had a few boys his age show up, his nurses and their families, some great friends from church and some neighbors as well.
We all ate and drank well.
The kids had a great time throwing a little soft football around.
Josh received several nice gifts.
And we all had a great visit.
It seemed the party was a huge success even if it couldn't happen at the park this year.
THANK YOU!!
Josh and I worked on some thank you poster cards for Pizza Hut and Starbucks.
Here are a couple of pictures we took of Josh to use on those cards:
A LATE BIRTHDAY GIFT
Besides the party, I had hoped to be able to give Josh a gift he has been wanting a while - his own laptop computer.
He has a pretty severe learning disability. But he loves to look up information on the computer about pretty much anything he learns about in school.
He had been trying to save money from selling cookies, etc. but still had not collected very much.
So, I put out a request on a local yahoo group called Freecycle for a used laptop computer.
I did not get any responses back before Josh's birthday, so had given up on receiving one for Josh.
But more than a week past Josh's birthday, I was contacted by email. A lady asked if I'd ever gotten a computer for Josh from a fellow freecycler. I told her I had not. And she said she and her husband had one they were no longer using. She would ask her husband to get it prepared and would bring it to us for Josh.
They did and brought it over yesterday (Saturday, Oct 2nd).
Josh was still asleep when they came by with it. My husband, sister and I started looking at it to make sure it would be able to get on the internet and everything. We loaded programming into it that would allow Josh to get online wirelessly. And we found that this was one of the nicest computers we'd seen. The couple even gave us their nice leather case for it.
The wife told me that her husband had walked in telling her they should think about getting rid of that computer because they no longer used it right as she'd noticed my post about wanting a computer for Josh. We decided it was God's moving that brought this all together.
Since Josh's birthday was already 2 weeks behind us, I thought about holding the computer as a Christmas present for Josh. But after looking it over and getting it all ready for Josh, I was too excited to wait. I went up and woke him. I told him we had something for him downstairs, but he had to do his breathing treatment, take his medicines and get dressed before he could see it. He did all that and was so thrilled to see his gift. It was kind of like Christmas morning!!!
1 comment:
That is so amazing that they were able to give him a computer! At his age, it's certainly almost a necessity! And there's a lot of stuff for him to learn on the net. Glad the party worked out well too. I hate it when the plans don't work as you want them, but it looks like it was a good time!
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