Happy 9th Birthday Kendall

Kendall and his birthday pie and cupcake (I'll explain later.)

It seems impossible that nine years have passed since that wild car ride to the hospital and the whirlwind labor and delivery that brought Kendall into this world. But it has been the most delightful 9 years we could have ever wished for. Kendall quickly earned the nickname "Sunshine Boy" as a baby because of his easy-going temperament and a smile that could light up the entire room. He's still definitely full of sunshine. He is our little jokester and loves to make us laugh. He is quick to help out whenever he sees a need and is such a peacemaker with his brothers and sisters. They all love playing with Kendall and he gets along with them all really well. Kendall has an amazing spirit about him that seems to draw others to him and he really is a light to everyone he come in contact with. We wonder sometimes if it is because of the heart problems he was born with and the times that even at a terribly young age he knew he had to rely on the Lord to help him through, that makes him such a spriritual giant to us. Whatever the reason, he is amazing and we are so blessed to have him in our family.

In primary, they did the following spotlight on him:

Full Name: Kendall Royce Oswald (in keeping with our tradition of giving our children middle names of relatives, Kendall shares his middle name with his dad)

Age: 9 Birthdate/Place: December 7, 1999 / Tucson, Arizona

School: He is in 3rd grade at Harrington Elementary School which is right across the street from our house.

Favorite things:

Color: red and blue

Food: strawberries (and if they are covered with chocolate, that's even better!); he loves just about every kind of food that he tries.

TV show: Spongebob Squarepants and The Suite Life of Zach and Cody

Movie: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Book: The Harry Potter series, Magic Treehouse series, Series of Unfortunate Events

Activities: reading, writing stories, camping, playing soccer, board games, puzzles, playing with friends, arts and crafts, watching movies and TV, going to the playground, family vacations, listening to music.

For his party this year, it was just our family. A couple of years ago, I was going insane trying to plan so many birthday parties with all the kids' friends so we scaled back to every other year. So every even-numbered birthday, the kids can invite friends. The other years, it's just us. Guess which one I like best? Guess which one the kids like best? Anyway, it was a fun day even without Kendall inviting his entire class at school and all the kids from church, and all the kids from past classes... It was on a Sunday which he actually thought was pretty cool because he got to go to church and have lots of people wishing him a happy birthday. After church there was a recital that was being held at the United Methodist Church in Marshall where the music director there and one of the missionaries from our branch who is ultra-talented at the piano were teaming up to perform a really amazing program. We all wanted to go, but were sort of thinking of not going because it was two hours after church so by the time we went home and ate lunch, it's be time to turn right around and go back. But Kendall really wanted to go. So we packed a lunch and hung out at the church for a couple of hours and then went to the concert. We're all really glad we did because it really was a fabulous performance. That evening we had Nana come over to watch him open gifts and share some pie and ice cream before she had to go back home (Kayleigh was really sick that day) and then Timothy came over for a bit. We did a chocolate cream pie instead of a cake for a couple of reasons. 1. We made a whole bunch of cupcakes for Kendall's school class on Friday and we had lots of them left over so I really didn't want to make another cake on top of that and 2. I had some leftover pie crust from making chicken pot pie on Sat. night for dinner so this seemed like a good way to use it up. Kendall thought it was pretty cool anyway. He says he had a great day (although he says his 8th birthday was a little better but that was a huge party at the kids museum and you can't beat that!) Happy birthday Kendalito!