The last wishing tradition shared in the beautiful book, Wish, by Roseanne Thong, is the American tradition of blowing out the candles.  Growing up, I would think about my wish for weeks before I blew out the candles.  I don’t know if they ever came true, for since you tell no one, I had always forgotten what I’d wished for by the next year.  🙂

Today the kiddos celebrated at two birthday parties: one for Stevie Kate (3 yrs), and another for Aunt Nellie (98 yrs).  Stevie’s was a purple party, and the kiddos had a blast.  The dancer came home with darling purple toes, and the builder had drummed to his heart’s content on Jake’s drum set. 

Lesa graciously sent a purple balloon home with each of the excited kiddos. 

When the explorer was rudely awakened from his carseat slumber, he could be nothing but elated by the beautiful floating gem above his head. (gotta love the builder’s face in this photo, he was animatedly explaining something…as usual…as I captured the moment).

We managed to arrive home this evening with one balloon.  🙂  We are not used to worrying about escaping balloons from the mini van…just kiddos.  So we watched one climb into the clouds at Costco, and then on the way home, after a potty break, we realized that another had found it’s destiny!