1/7 Maile's School Birthday Party

Since Maile's birthday was during her school's break, I figured we'd do the school celebration after the break. We first tried on Friday, January 2, because Maile had school that day. But there was only about 4 kids in her classroom when I dropped her off. So, her Chinese teacher suggested we do it Monday. She also said I should bring photos from each year of her life, maybe put together a DVD about Maile, which other parents have done, and see if Maile would like to sing a song or read a story. I was still thinking about the DVD suggestion when I left.

When I told Hansel about the DVD, he suggested I just create a video like he did for me for Christmas and use the song he wrote for Maile. So I spent part of the weekend putting together the slideshow/video. Hansel also thought it'd be a good idea to put the video he made on the same DVD since Maile likes to sing along to the song.

On Monday I got to Maile's school with all the birthday stuff at 4p like her teacher suggested. As soon as I walked in, her teacher was walking to the front and said that Maile just threw up. I was not expecting that. Maile seemed fine that morning. But there she was sitting in the middle of the classroom with paper towels and barf (pardon my French) on her lap. The assistant teacher was shocked that I got there so quickly not realizing I had come for Maile's birthday party.

Suffice it to say, we didn't celebrate her birthday. I kept Maile home on Tuesday. Third time was the charm. We made it to school on Wednesday. I got there at 4p, and Maile was ready to go. The kids were very excited. They kept crowding around me as I was setting up the laptop with the videos.

The teacher placed a light in the middle of their circle and laid out a card with each month of the year around the circle. For each year of Maile's life, the teacher would lay down a stick and Maile would walk around the circle holding a globe. As she walked around, the kids sang Happy Birthday. They sang it in English, Chinese, and Spanish. Talk about multi-lingual. The teacher asked me to tell a little story about Maile for each year. So I described each of her birthday celebrations.

Then, we got to the videos. I explained that the first video was about our family. We had a rocky start with the kids yelling, "I can't see. I can't hear." But I started the first video over again, and all was better in the world. One boy was actually trying to sing along. Maile sang along and danced around. For the second video I explained that her Daddy had written the song after Maile was born and that the video included photos of Maile from when she was a baby until now. After the videos were done, one of the kids said they wanted to see it again. So, I'm guessing they were a hit.

After, Maile passed out goody bags and then the kids went out to the food tables for a birthday treat. I took the easy route and bought cookies. The kids sang happy birthday to Maile very loudly before digging in.