This Week's Monday Moment with Mimi...Pleasure in Parties!

With family spread all around in recent years, our family has learned that moments we spend together are precious.  Enjoy this fun post from Mimi, reminding us to look for joy in the little things and never forget the importance of carving out memories with your loved ones! :-)  Enjoy and share, Shannon

Pleasure in Parties

As I drove back from Savannah from my granddaughter’s 3^rd “Fairy” birthday party, I thought what a fun, exciting, and wonderful day it had been!

 Ah, parties…I must say that my daughters can “do up” a birthday–they will make you smile, laugh, and cry with their earnest efforts to honor someone on his/her special day!

But in my family, I truly cannot keep up with what date “the birthday” actually is, because we just celebrate on those precious occasions when we can all be together.  Sometimes that means parties that are days, or even weeks, away from the birthday!!!!!!!!

Did I mention the fun time we had at a St. Patrick’s Day party in Savannah as we followed the Leprechauns’ green feet on a scavenger hunt that my youngest daughter hosted…or the July 4^th party in Daytona celebrating a 9^th birthday decked out in red, white and blue, in spite of the fact it was the week after the 4th?

I could go on and on – but you get the idea of our gatherings. Or do you? Let me give you a visual of just one.

Memorial Day was the only time the family could be together at our place at the lake. So……Poppy’s June 2^nd birthday was celebrated then, along with Sadie’s birthday (that had actually been back on April 11^th.)

 Poppy was turning the Big 60, and Sadie wanted a Superhero dress up party for her 5^th, so we decided to do both in a combination celebration! My daughters planned games reflecting upon Poppy’s 60 years of life, and we all dressed up as Superhero Characters for Sadie…Can you picture it?

Me…I decided to be Wonder Woman – a more modest, but still detailed version. As the party continued, the game we played honoring Poppy was charades. We were acting out small parts of Poppy’s life that we remembered most. I drew out “Barrel Racing” from the pile of charade cards.  I quickly stood up, hit my side as if I were riding on the horse encouraging him around the barrels, and galloped as hard and fast as humanly possible around the length of the porch, weaving in and around the chairs.

No one was guessing what I was acting out, for they were laughing so hard at the galloping Wonder Woman. I made another lap, and another, until my feet hurt. My grandson, with some serious concern said, “Mimi, the neighbors are watching you. They stood up on their porch and are looking at us.” I thought, well I should hope so!!!! A 58 year old Wonder Woman galloping around a small porch full of 10 others, ages 2 to 60, also dressed in hero attire certainly merited watching.

I paint this visual, to tell you that the weekend was wonderful – not because of the “bigness” of the party or the “where” of it. It also was not a traditional family gathering such as those at Thanksgiving or Christmas.  Our celebration was simply about a family, our family!  For that day we took time out of our busy lives to honor each other and laugh with each other.  Being together like this cannot happen “all” of the time - but with effort, it can happen “some” of the time. We can all seize precious moments to gather, to be a different character, to laugh, and to celebrate with joy.

We can, as a family, put on hold the diversity of careers, the conflict of everyday schedules, the hope of future dreams…and we can all sit on the same porch and laugh.

Maybe our children and grandchildren need to see that we do live our lives responsibly grounded in reality, but every so often it is okay to dress up as a hero, sit with your family, and take your turn galloping with your whole heart.

Maybe it would do the world good to see this side of family fun in us as well!!!!! 

Blessings, Mimi (Anne)