Golden Birthday Buddies

Today is a very special day for two girls in our lives....

My oldest daughter, Sydney and our Compassion child, Yoselin 

are celebrating their golden birthday!

They are both 9 on the 9th!

I cannot even begin to tell you how happy and thankful I am that both of my daughters have birthday buddies. It adds so much to our birthday celebrations and has been a wonderful way for my daughters to feel more connected to the ministry of Compassion's child sponsorship. 

If you want help finding a birthday buddy for your child, grandchild, niece, nephew, self...

let me know!

Celebrate Birthdays

Do you celebrate birthdays in your family?

Most likely the answer to that question is yes. So why not expand your list of birthday celebrations to included the birthday of your sponsored child.

If you happen to sponsor a birthday buddy, then this will be super easy to do. If your sponsored child has a different birthday, consider ways that your family can celebrate.

Here are some ideas:

• The most obvious is to send a birthday card or letter, but this will need to be done 6-8 weeks in advance to arrive in time.
• Make a special dinner (consider cooking food from your sponsored child's country) and have a birthday cake for dinner.
• As a family, spend time in prayer for your sponsored child.
• As a family, sit down and write to your sponsored child, telling them how much you enjoy your relationship with them.
• Tell your family and friends - I usually write a special blog post announcing our child's birthday - just as I would about one of my biological children.

What other ideas can you think of?

Do a Happy Dance

I think my friend Michelle created the happy dance. A happy dance is simply the surge of joy that runs through your body when you find a letter from your sponsored child in your mailbox.

Today I'm suggesting you literally do a "happy dance" with your family when a letter arrives. I'm pretty sure our sponsored children get excited when they get letters from us.

Here's a demonstration of my girls doing a happy dance after finding two letters in our mailbox today....

For us, doing a happy dance makes receiving letters a shared experience. We get excited to open the letters up and hear what our sponsored kids have to say.

Do you celebrate when you receive a letter?