The Youngest of Nine

I think it would be pretty safe to say that nearly all of our children, when they come into our shelter, have absolutely no idea when their birthday is. That would be true for older children as well as the younger ones. And having no idea when their birthdays are, few of our children have ever celebrated their birthdays before coming to CSC.

But it doesn't take our kids long to find out what celebrating a birthday is all about. We do it about 70 -80 times a year so that each child gets their own special day to be in the spotlight. We don't do anything too fancy, but it's a very big deal for each child. The staff will join the home of the child that's having a birthday for a special meal (chicken and spaghetti are the most common menu items!), we have some cake and ice cream, and each child will receive a gift bag with some treasured gifts.

Tonight we celebrated Jashley Mae's 4th birthday. Jashley is the youngest of a group of nine siblings we have and this was a very big deal for her. The rest of Jashley's siblings had already celebrated their birthdays this year and Jashley knew her birthday was on September 29. Now, as a four-year-old, Jashley doesn't really understand that she's the last of her siblings to celebrate during a calendar year, but she knew the date and she knew it had been a long time since her last birthday. In fact, she has regularly let us know her birthday was on September 29 since early summer.Well, Jashley celebrated her birthday "outside the box" tonight. It has long been CSC tradition to wear the color red on your birthday and rarely is that "violated." But tonight Jashley was dressed like a little princess in a shiny blue dress. Cute, cute, cute. And don't let Jashley's expression from the pictures deceive you that she wasn't having a good time. That is Jashley's happy face and she was having a GREAT time!