{"id":7832,"date":"2014-07-10T22:19:30","date_gmt":"2014-07-11T02:19:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/?p=7832"},"modified":"2014-07-10T22:19:30","modified_gmt":"2014-07-11T02:19:30","slug":"jaia-at-7-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/?p=7832","title":{"rendered":"Jaia at 7.5"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Celebrating Jaia&#8217;s half birthday seems crazy to some. \u00a0Don&#8217;t we spoil our kids enough? \u00a0I actually think we do spoil our kids enough. \u00a0I&#8217;m thankful to live a life that allows me give my children opportunities that I may not have had as a child. I am not embarrassed about that. \u00a0I&#8217;m not embarrassed about being able to sign my kids up for activities or adding an extra gift or two under the Christmas tree. \u00a0I am lucky &#8211; we are lucky &#8211; and I don&#8217;t take that for granted.<\/p>\n<p>What I try my best to focus on, with my kids, is gratitude. \u00a0No matter the opportunities afforded to our children, they should be taught to be grateful. \u00a0Not just simply uttering the words &#8216;thank you&#8217;. \u00a0Though lovely to hear, those words can often be said out of habit. \u00a0What I want for my kids is to truly appreciate how lucky they are. \u00a0And not only for the shiny new toy, but because they have a hot meal placed on the table every night, and a drawer full of clean clothes when they look for it each morning.<\/p>\n<p>Our kids are lucky. \u00a0And mostly, they know it. \u00a0A work in progress.<\/p>\n<p>So then you ask, why we celebrate Jaia (and Wesley&#8217;s) half birthdays? \u00a0Because I think that any reason to celebrate a person and make them feel extra special is reason enough. \u00a0And not that I need to defend our decision, but our half birthday parties involve a song and some cake. \u00a0No presents. \u00a0No guests. \u00a0No parties. \u00a0Just us acknoledging a fun milestone.<\/p>\n<p>This year Nana and Papoo were in town and we shared a tiny cake for breakfast. \u00a0And there was a song. \u00a0And suddenly, she&#8217;s that much closer to turning 8. \u00a0Definitely worth celebrating.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-7836\" src=\"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/half-birthday-768x1024.jpg\" alt=\"half birthday\" width=\"725\" height=\"967\" srcset=\"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/half-birthday-768x1024.jpg 768w, http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/half-birthday-225x300.jpg 225w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 725px) 100vw, 725px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-7839\" src=\"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/jaia_7.52-1024x724.jpg\" alt=\"jaia_7.5\" width=\"750\" height=\"531\" srcset=\"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/jaia_7.52-1024x724.jpg 1024w, http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/jaia_7.52-300x212.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 750px) 100vw, 750px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Celebrating Jaia&#8217;s half birthday seems crazy to some. \u00a0Don&#8217;t we spoil our kids enough? \u00a0I actually think we do spoil our kids enough. \u00a0I&#8217;m thankful to live a life that allows me give my children opportunities that I may not have had as a child. I am not embarrassed about that. \u00a0I&#8217;m not embarrassed about [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[6,26,29,37],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7832"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7832"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7832\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7842,"href":"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7832\/revisions\/7842"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7832"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7832"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/forgetful.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7832"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}