Max's birthday

Today was Maximilian Kolbe's second birthday.

Our son is an incredible kid.  He is sweet, and creative, and downright funny.

And he's adjusted really well to the new reality of our lives.  He's spending more time than usual with me. And my mom, his Amma, is here, and they get along famously.  But he knows his mom isn't here, or his sister, and every so often he looks around for them, nervously. When we skype, or facetime, his face lights up with a smile reserved for Kate.

Good morning, sweet boy

Still, though, he's doing well in difficult circumstances.


And I wanted to make his birthday special.


When he woke up, I spent an extra-long time cuddling with him, and singing our family's birthday song, and tickling, and laughing.


He spent a good day with my mom, and she let him do the things he really likes, like vacuuming. (he is a very good boy!)

When I got home, he helped me make some chili, and then two families we love came over.

We ate chili, and homemade hummus, and blew up balloons.  He loved the balloons.

We sang "happy birthday" and ate cupcakes.

He got a present he loved, a percussion table, with a drumhead, and a xylophone, and a top-hat cymbal.  He played the xylophone for a long time before chewing on the drumstick.

After everyone left, we put on pajamas, and built a fire, and with Amma, we sang the songs Max loves.  The kid loves music.  Mostly hymns, and chant.  We sang advent songs, and some of his favorite hymns, and he cuddled on my legs.  I rubbed his back until he fell asleep.

It was a very good day.

But-- we're a family when we're together, and we missed Kate and Pia terribly.

I was thinking about one of Max's favorite songs, and especially this verse, written by Thomas Ken in 1674:

Teach me to live, that I may dread
The grave as little as my bed.
Teach me to die, that so I may
Rise glorious at the judgment day

I think God is teaching us, through all this cancer stuff, and through parenting in general, to live fearlessly.  This life should be about love.  Eternal life will be about love too.  And we have two kids who love very well.  They want nothing more than they want to share love with us-- to be in communion with us.  They crave the community of our love. If we spend our lives craving love's community, we won't fear death: we'll see it as the entrance to a deeper kind of love.  My beautiful kids, and my selfless wife, teach me that.  I'm a pretty lucky guy.