Irie's Birthday

Irie finally got to have a birthday en française. She puts a lot of importance on holidays, something we're not entirely pleased with, as her expectations always aim for the moon. She waited, rather impatiently, for the almost 11 months since we left home, watching Lisa have her birthday, then Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Valentine's Day went by, and finally my birthday. We've been hearing about how hers was "next" ever since then. She must spend a lot of time worrying in her head because she has a serious need for everything to go just exactly perfectly, which as we adults know, never does.

Anyway, we thought she had a great birthday yesterday. Her Nana is here (Terri too), the weather was perfect, and loads of people remembered her. We sent out invitations before the school vacation to 8 friends to come to our apt. for the two-hour lunchtime this first day back to school. 7 of them were able to make it:
Thea, Lily Rose, Laly, Noame, Abbie, Assia, and the lucky boy, Abel.
Marching this troop the two blocks home from school was a riot, and as was true for the duration of the party, they all had tons of energy.
Poor Maggie was exhausted after the party (as were we adults).
We set up a table and blankets in the courtyard where they manged on fruit, candy, chips and drinks
while Dad cooked pizzas. After the pizza, Irie opened up all her fabulous gifts, and then it was time for cake and ice cream. They even sang Happy Birthday in english We thought the party went great, to have 7 French friends show up with smiles and gifts, but Irie felt it was too short and thought she was being ignored. We tried to point out that they were excited by an American birthday party, the dog, the food, going to a party at lunchtime, that everything about it was new to them, even the climbing tree was a hit.
The guests all had a blast!

After school, we were going to surprise Irie with her first parasail adventure but it started raining so that will happen tomorrow. Meanwhile, she got skyped by lots of family members in MI, a dozen emails from friends in OR, and a phone call from our French friend Nathalie. Despite all this attention, as bedtime approached she was incredibly sad that her birthday was "so short." We are hoping this is just a phase and that we know she misses her friends back home, but our continuous message is that she controls her own happiness. Today, she seems to be realizing that it was a special day and is back to making set-ups and telling stories with some of her new presents.