Happy 88th Birthday Mom!

We were fortunate and blessed to have celebrated Mom’s 88 birthday yesterday at Harmony Assisted Living in Roanoke.

While it was a small family celebration, it was so nice having the family together, and we were thankful to Harmony for providing us a party room in the library there, especially during this COVID pandemic.

Since being released from the hospital recently, Mom has been sleeping much of the day, and we were concerned she wouldn’t be up celebrating her birthday, with so many family at once. Fortunately one of the staff members made sure she was up and ready, and wheeled her down to the first floor Library for the 3pm festivities.

My sister Jenni immediately presented and put on Mom’s wrist, a special birthday bracelet she had made.

While Mom was tired at first, she perked up after seeing all the decorations,, family and a little caffeine from the Diet Coke. In addition to Steve (DOS) and myself, my brother Andy and partner Art, sister Jenni and husband Lawrence and daughter Nikki were there. We did have to wear masks, although we could take them off for eating the birthday cake, and a couple times for photos.

Andy had made a beautiful flower arrangement, and had ordered a trio of ballon decorations which we picked up from the store on our way there. Likewise Jenni had ordered a birthday cake and some other birthday decorations that were placed on the conference room table.

While there was only a single candle decorating the cake, it was a musical candle that played Happy Birthday! Mom blew out the candle, and we each were each treated to some birthday cake.

Later Mom opened her birthday cards and a couple gifts. I made Mom a homemade photo card showing the three children.

So she wouldn’t get too tired, we just had Mom open the family cards from those of us attending her party, while the cards mailed to her would be opened later.

For a birthday present, I had two 16 x 20 inch canvas prints made from old photos and gave them to her. One was a black and white print of the family from 1969 (when I was seven) that showed the family at a farewell reception for Dad as we were moving from Alexandria, Virginia to Roanoke. Like any photo, it captures the essence of the time when it was taken, and here we are all smiles, although I’m wondering how it must have been a bit apprehensive for Mom and Dad moving to another city, house, and church with 3 young children.

The second photo I took was enlarged from a small color snapshot, taken around 1966 in Mom’s childhood home in Douglas, Georgia. The photo is of Mom on the left, and her Mom (our Grandmom) holding my sister Jenni., It was a three generation photo and I took a current day photo of Mom with Jenni holding the canvas print at the party.