a brighter place

My mother's number rose to 89 today. We had a good time. All her children got together to give her one of those electronic photo frames. Youngest helped me load on the photos but I still don't have it right, for if I can't figure out how to easily turn it on, how will she? So it remains at our house until ....

We treated her to a favorite Italian restaurant. But before that she spoke on the phone to sister, daughter, son, friend ... and the very icing on the cake--her first skype session with a brand new great grandson (#2 of a set of twins, yes you read that correctly--#1 twin was away in nicu working on some breathing issues) from his hospital room! He yawned, stretched, cooed, opened his eyes, and turned to look at his grandma who was holding him. Yep, we saw and heard it all. After we "hung up" mom turned to me and said,"What an amazing world we live in."

The best fun of the night was in a card from a friend that mom and I share. Her humor is unstoppable. The above image is scanned from her card and inside she penned, "Has anyone tried putting all your candles on a cake? It certainly would make your world a brighter place!"

Well, no we haven't tried fitting all those candles on a cake. In fact, there was no cake at all this year, only brownies from a friend (as long as it's chocolate we're good here.) But it was a wonderful birthday, blessed by abundance of new friends (most of her old ones are no longer on this earth), family, and the smiles of now 8 great grandchildren!