Birthday Wishes

Wednesday was Nastya's 5th birthday. She was so excited as she was able to start celebrating early. My sister came by from out of town and gave her presents to start what turned out to be a 3-day celebration. Of course she loved it and soaked it all in. After our "month of birthday's" the three youngest have learned that birthdays are special and now they get very excited. While we were having cake and icecream on Wednesday, I asked Polina if they fixed birthday cakes at the detsky dom. We had heard that at some orphanages, they fix one cake each month for the kids that have a birthday in that particular month. Polina told us they did not get any birthday cake. It is sad to know that birthdays come and go for all the children over there and there is no one to hug them and tell them "happy birthday" and to let them know they are special. Such a small thing it seems, but to see their faces light up shows that it means something special to them. Just this morning we received an e-mail from Aunt Tatiana wishing her a happy birthday and apologizing for not being able to send a note sooner. She does not have a computer, but she knows someone who does that lives nearby.

After the birthday celebration,the kids all went to Awana at church. They came home wound up and full of energy so it took a while to settle them down for bed. About 10:30PM, I made the rounds to check on everyone and to tell Jeremy and Christina goodnight. Nastya was asleep, but a few minutes later,Dawn heard her crying. She often cries while she sleeps which is oddly common for kids with their background. When Dawn checked on her, she was awake and crying, so she brought her to our bed. Nastya told us she was sad and when we asked why, she told us she missed her groupa. She said she wanted us all get in the car, go to the airport, get on an airplane and go visit her groupa. We explained that it was very, very expensive to go visit her groupa and that we could not do that just now. She cried, and then Dawn started to cry with her. Then my precious little girl said somethings that made me tear up. She told us that at her destky dom, they did not have new shoes, they only had old shoes - and she wanted them to have new shoes. She said she wanted to send them her money so they could buy new shoes. We hugged her and explained that we had collected money from our church to buy them some new shoes (about $800). That seemed to calm her down a little.

If only the rest of my Christian brothers and sisters had a heart the size of my little girl's . . .