On Celebrating Special Days With Family

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On Celebrating Special Days with Family

With Special Guest Megan Bratetic

 My birthday is important to me because I really love to celebrate my birthday to be with my whole family. And two years ago I also invited my friends to celebrate my birthday too. We order pizza and breadsticks and dip sauce too from Pizza Hut. And we also have birthday cake too. It is a ice cream cake with mint ice cream and Oreo cookie and sing Happy Birthday to me. And we also watch a movie the new Annie with Jamie Foxx and Cameron Diaz and Jada Pinkett Smith too. We also open presents too we also played Wii and a board game called Life too. On my last birthday was a little hard for me to celebrate my birthday. We have a hard summer and it is feel different without my Grandpa to be there to celebrate my birthday. And I did have a wonderful and really good birthday I have, it just felt a little lonely.

   

Birthday Celebrations are a fun time for our family where we usually get together for dinner and open presents.

Christmas is important to me because it is also celebrate Jesus Christ birthday and it is a holiday that we celebrate it with our family and also our grandparents and uncles and aunts and cousins too. And we have Christmas all around us all through in our people’s life. We also have a Christmas lunch and or Christmas dinner. It is our special moment and times that we have in our family too. We have a lot of pray to Jesus Christ and Savor our Lord and Shepherd on this holiday forever and always. Christmas is a tradition to our lives in our family. This holiday represent too the good and wonderful place on Earth.

Leah’s words are so precious. Thanks Leah for always giving us little lessons about life. Before I begin, I would like to introduce myself as this is my first time writing a post. My name is Megan Bratetic, Leah’s other sister, and I have the pleasure of being a guest blogger this month. It has been an incredible experience reading Lindsay and Leah’s posts and I’m just bursting with pride for what they are doing and for being a part of this family. Thank you so much for your interest and it is our hope that we can help other families through our stories. Leah and I are only a year and a half apart, so we’ve really grown up side by side. She has influenced my life in more positive ways than I could ever explain and I love her from the bottom of my heart.

One of my favorite parts about celebrating any special occasion with Leah is that she gives us some kind of performance. She practices these leading up to the special day and gives it her all each time. Sometimes she will do a dance for us. Sometimes she sings. One time she read a poem that she wrote. But each time her performance is a tender, thoughtful moment and is more heartwarming than our family could ever ask for. She has a knack for picking a meaningful song with spot-on lyrics that touch our hearts. We look forward to these performances and it’s a chance for all of us to let the rest of the world stand still and to see the simple beauty of Leah, making our world a little brighter.

Another gift that Leah gives our family at special occasions is her Birthday and Christmas lists. Each year, Leah works very hard on putting these lists together as she not only comes up with the items, but also researches where you can go to get them and the prices. I always anticipate getting these lists and love to see what she comes up with. The lists have definitely evolved throughout the years, I should call them a packet rather than a list, but what I love about them is that they help us discover more about how she thinks and what makes her happy. These lists are gems that I cherish and pull out from time to time and they always make me smile.

 I wanted to share a couple examples of her lists so you could understand the charm that comes through in her own Leah way. Each one typically starts with a title page and categories, followed by several pages of very detailed items and descriptions. It is very fun to see what kinds of movies and CDs she likes. Sometimes I wonder how she even knows of the artists and movies. There can be some real wild cards. The music requests have come in anywhere from Heart to Queen Latifah to Liza Minnelli. And movies have quite the range too…from The Geisha Boy with Jerry Lewis to Peter Pan with Mary Martin and her all time favorite Pure Luck with Martin Short.

                 

Examples of Leah’s Christmas and Birthday Lists.

I asked Leah to explain how she makes her lists because I am fascinated with her skill in doing this. Not only are they very creative, but her computer and research skills are very impressive. Here is her explaining how she makes her lists:

When I start to make my listing for Christmas and birthdays, I start to type in and to be on the aol.com website on the computer and also to type the websites from the store’s websites and Amazon website too. I also minimize it to be small and have it down on the computer screen. I search things with my paperwork with me and also I have things that already had when I do with my past listings. I have it with my files that I have it with me too. And that how I to do to make it. I also make copys and give it out to people and to go to shopping before we celebrate that birthdays and the holidays like Christmas too. That I love to do in my spare time and to hang out and to do it all by myself. It is a really good thing to have that and fun thing to enjoy to do.

I’ll close by sharing our most recent celebration which happened to be my birthday. Leah made sure to make it very special for me. She kicked off the day with the best text message a sister could receive. Leah wrote:

  

My birthday text from Leah.

Leah’s plans for my birthday celebration.

“Sis is a short word means sister.” Now that line alone made my day. I was actually dealing with a pretty bad cold on my birthday and we moved our plans to another day, but Leah, being the thoughtful soul that she is, wanted to bring me flowers on my actual birthday. I heard a knock at the door and there she was, standing at the door with a bouquet of flowers. “Happy Birthday. I hope you feel better soon,” she said. That was just the sweetest thing. Leah cares so deeply for all of us and she pours her heart into making us feel special. She really went the extra mile this year and even planned a party with flower birthday balloons, Happy Birthday sign and Birthday cake. Her handwritten party plans let me know even more that she wanted me to have a good birthday. And I definitely did.

Leah and I throughout the years. Best buddies for life.

To Leah, birthdays and Christmas are about being with family. She looks forward to these occasions all year and once one is done, she’s already planning the next one. She knows that these times bring us all together and she tries her very best to make them memorable. So, with the holiday season upon us, let’s all take our cue from Leah and cherish the time with family and friends and do something special for one other.

Here’s to turning our minds Upside Down

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