Birthdays are so much fun, aren’t they? And specially when it comes to children, they get so excited that they try to remind us a month earlier. And I have always observed that girls are more excited about celebrating birthdays than boys, particularly mine. My son Suhas is never that interested to celebrate his birthday, but my daughters start thinking about it six months earlier. I got twins in my second pregnancy, a boy and a girl- Suhas and Srinidhi. They share their birthday on April 24th, which is also cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar’s birthday. Somehow, I could never celebrate their birthday in a grand way starting from their first one.  Even though I had planned something, someone or other in the family would fall sick or something else would happen and it would end up in a less celebratory way. I have always promised them that I will celebrate their 10th birthday in a grand way like their sister’s. So, I always had that guilt in my heart that for my twins I never celebrated it well and when we look at the birthday albums that guilt increases.  I wanted to keep my promise, but unfortunately as we met this accident last year, I couldn’t fulfil it.  I threw a small party on the terrace in my house with close friends and family. And I promised them that this year I would try to do my best.

 It is said that “When we plan something, God has his own plans for us”. This year we were in Brazil for the medical treatment and we hardly knew anyone there. As the birthday was nearing, I was a bit confused and sad to tell my twins that we’re not going to have any birthday party this year too. Two days before their birthday, that is on 22nd April, while braiding my younger daughter Srinidhi’s hair, I struck a conversation with her. I said, “Nidhi, what do you want for your birthday?” She replied with excitement “Mom, please don’t tell me anything, I want it to be a surprise”. I was more confused and with much hesitation I told her, “I am sorry to disappoint you dear, but I want to tell you that I’m not planning any party, because we don’t know anyone here. It’s just the five of us”.  Interrupting my explanation, she immediately said “That’s what’s more important Mom! Isn’t it a big thing that we five are together as a family? I’m more than happy as long as I have you guys with me”. I was speechless. I didn’t know what to say. I was surprised to see how positive she is towards life and the way she looks at it and that too at the age of eleven. I didn’t realise that my little doll has got so much maturity in her that she is saying such big things. And how true it is. Isn’t it enough that we all are together as a family, even after such a big mishap took place in our lives? I didn’t have anything else to tell her except “Yes darling, you’re so true. Thank you for making me realise this”. And in that moment only I decided that I’m not going to let her down on her special day.  I thought of doing a nice theme party which they never had in their last birthdays.

As I always see my twins playing the game Minecraft all the time, I thought it would be a nice theme to try. But as I didn’t have any idea about the game, I thought it was better to get some knowledge on the game and characters. I didn’t want to throw a surprise party with the wrong characters and make a mess of the theme. So, I asked Suhas to give me a brief introduction about the game. He was so excited to talk about Minecraft and without any delay he started telling me about the game and characters in it. He was going on and on that I fell asleep listening to him. When I woke up, I thought it would be better to take him out for some shopping to buy the decorations and stuff as I didn’t understand anything about the game. So, we both went to a shop which was about a 45 minutes drive from our place (that was the nearest one we could find). As we walked into the shop, we couldn’t find anything that was related to the Minecraft theme, except for a banner written “FELIZ ANIVERSARIO” (Happy birthday in Portuguese). We were quite disappointed for not getting what we were looking for but as we’re not one among those who give up easily, we grabbed everything that was related to the colours of minecraft. So we picked up green table cloth, green balloons, tissues, paper cups, plates etc etc.

After coming back home, I started googling DIY projects for Minecraft theme parties. I noted down some of the ideas I liked and prepared a list of things that I needed to buy. My husband and I went to a supermarket nearby and bought the stuff that were needed for snacks and drinks. When we came out of the supermarket, I picked up some of the cardboard boxes that were thrown outside. I picked different sizes. Then on our way back home, we went to a stationary shop and bought some colour papers, glue, etc. There was just one more day to go and we were all excited to do something creative for the birthday theme. We sat down and started cutting the colour papers and pasting them on boxes to make the character’s faces. Suhas took the printouts of the characters, my husband cut them into the desired shape and I started decorating the wall. The entire evening was spent in preparing decorations. My elder daughter Sheetal was busy making an Oreo-Nutella cheesecake (no bake). She even took charge of planning games, and was very excited in making a ‘treasure hunt’.

I was done with decorating the wall and dining table according to the theme. Then, it was time to prepare snacks and drinks. For drinks I bought tiny bottles of Fanta, Pepsi and Sprite. We removed the labels and pasted our custom made labels according to the theme. They looked pretty cool. We all were getting excited as it was all coming together. I started arranging plates for snacks on the table and labelled them. It was 2 a.m. and we were all dead tired, so we went to bed.

Soon it was morning! I woke up at 6 a.m with the alarm ringing on my phone. I freshened up and entered the kitchen. Srinidhi gave me a wish-list that included 11 things for her 11th birthday and the first one on the list was “Breakfast in Bed” (with a tag line below “Not bread and cheese. Traditional South Indian breakfast”) 😀  Hmm, girls always have big expectations, don’t they? My son didn’t ask for anything, he just said “Mom, make whatever’s easy for you”. But Srinidhi always likes to get treated like a Princess. So, I prepared a South Indian breakfast- Idli, Dosa and Vada along with chutneys. Sheetal and I entered her room singing “Happy Birthday to you, may all your dreams come true” and before Srinidhi could wake up, my husband woke up with a big smile on his face as if we were singing the song for his birthday! We couldn’t stop laughing at him by looking at his face and he was upset for a minute because he got fooled but later joined in with our laughter. Oh god, that was hilarious! I wish I had a camera handy to capture that moment. Then Srinidhi woke up and we wished her. Her dad fed her breakfast in bed and she enjoyed it to the fullest. I was so glad to see her first wish fulfilled.

Suhas wanted to wake up at 9.59 a.m as that was his birth time and he told us that we should wake him up only at that time. So, we waited till 9.59 a.m. and acted out a small skit as if I was about to deliver the baby and the baby was born. I must say, we’re indeed a dramatic family. 😛  While everyone was getting ready, I entered the kitchen to prepare snacks and main courses. It took me two and a half hours to finish my cooking and to set the table. Finally it was time to cut the cake. The cheesecake looked amazing! I must appreciate Sheetal’s efforts in preparing the cake for her siblings and the amount of love she put into it. We took lots of pictures, played games such as ‘pin the tail on the donkey’ (it was actually a pig in our case), sang a couple of songs and finally enjoyed the much awaited delicious lunch. What a feast! We ate to our heart’s content. Suhas and Srinidhi were so happy by how it all looked so perfect, and they enjoyed every bit of the party. I couldn’t count the number of times they said “Thank you Mom”.

Srinidhi was so right. Family is indeed more important than anything else in this world. Friends, relatives and colleagues may bring fun to the party, but family is the soul. And when the soul is there, rest all can be forgotten. When the twins said “Mom! This is the best birthday ever”, my happiness knew no bounds.

I’m glad I didn’t give up;

I’m glad I listened to my kids;

I’m glad I put efforts in making their big day special;

I’m glad I succeeded in bringing a smile on their faces.

Every moment that has passed will never come back. So live in the moment and try to make the most of it. Like someone said “Don’t wait for the perfect moment, take a moment and make it perfect”.

Sharing some pictures with you all. Hope you enjoy it 😀

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