Seven is heaven

We just finished Adam and Royce’s birthday celebrations and are attempting to catch our breath. For reasons that I now forget we held two separate but equal parties this year. Double birthdays and double parties are big excitement. A unicorn party for Royce and a Lego party for Adam. It was all good fun with pinning the horn on the unicorn and contests to build the tallest Lego tower but I am already re-thinking next year. We have a lot of leftover cake at this apartment.

Our parties this year were held on Friday May 21, which was a public holiday here, celebrating Buddha’s birthday. Buddha’s birthday is celebrated on the 8th day of the 4th month. Queen Maha Maya is suppose to have given birth to her son under a tree in Nepal near the border with India. People celebrate this holiday by bathing Buddha, particularly with perfume water. Many temples in Hong Kong held ceremonies, including the large outside Buddha statue on Lantau Island. While we did not make it to observe any celebrations this year, we were blessed the weather was fine for the twins and Buddha’s birthdays this year.

At school, the first grade has a system for celebrating children’s birthdays which involves baking a cake from scratch with selected students. While it all sounds lovely, it is a bit complicated with two cakes/ one oven and a cello concert with our older daughter ongoing at the same time. First grade teachers rose to the occasion and helped me get those cakes baked and decorated in time to watch the strings concert too. As I was working with two classes in the same kitchen, many students expressed wonder that Adam and Royce had the same birthday. Many forgot they were twins or never really understood it in the first place.

What I enjoyed more than the baking with the students was the birthday book that each class makes for the birthday student. Basically, each student writes what they think is important about the birthday child. The entries are so sweet and straight forward. Everything from “ You are good at four square” to “You are an imaginative person with fabulous ideas.” All the comments in both the books truly captured the kids as they are right now; active in sports and loving their friends and school. Both Adam and Royce wanted to sign their siblings’ birthday books. They are still very close and that is important to me.