Last fall we saw this hotel shaped like an airplane. Ellie couldn't get it out of her head. She desperately wanted to go inside and stay the night there. We told her maybe for her birthday...
Thankfully hotels aren't very expensive here. And we believe that 'experiences' trump gifts just for the sake of gifts (Ellie's not really into 'toys' and it's always a struggle to shop for her), so we decided to make a night at the airplane hotel part of her birthday celebration here for a unique way to remember this birthday.
It didn't disappoint! We had a comfortable room and had a little bit of time in the morning to enjoy the pool before going to kids' club.
We got our breakfast poolside! Yes, we were those crazy Americans who were in the pool at 7:30AM. Crazy thing was, it was hot enough at that early hour for the water to feel really good!
While we waited for our food, Ellie declared that the plane flew around the world while we slept and landed again. Reni couldn't believe she actually thought that (he's still trying to understand her imagination).
We had omelettes the size of dinner plates but Reni was most excited about the chocolate brioche.
I snapped this pic below to remind me how sweet it was to watch her lifting and helping her brother access all of the parts of the playground he wanted to enjoy. Her compassionate heart is one of my favorite things about her!
We pulled up to the ministry center at 9:58 and enjoyed a fantastic program brought by a visiting team from Arkansas (more about them later). That's our crazy friend Ken (a missionary in Elbasan) acting as Zacheus. He walked in on his knees and Reni said, "He looks like ME!"
Nathan had the great idea to bring cake pops for Ellie's birthday treats. Then he researched them on the internet for instructions and halved meat skewers to work as sticks.
In the process, we discovered that 'cake pops' have not made it to Albania yet. We got a lot of confused looks from our Albanian-English speaking friends, even when we described them. I think they were a hit. I wish I could remember why Luli was so tickled below.
Ambra brought Ellie the most beautiful bouquet of flowers (see my instagram feed at the top of the blog).
Yeah, we were going for purple and it turned out more 'gray'. Ah well.
Thank goodness for sprinkles at Conad (a grocery chain)! We paid a small fortune for them, but they really completed the look.
One of our birthday traditions for the last several birthdays has been to launch a paper lantern. I had a few left when we were packing up in the States and threw them in the bottom of a suitcase. Ellie was totally surprised and really pleased to show her village friends how these work.
The heat of the day made it take a while for the heat to rise substantially enough in the lantern, but once it was off, up and away it flew!
We brought home Ken's youngest daughter, J, who is just a month older than Ellie, for a sleepover. I think they all had a blast,
I brought over the #9 candle last year, but it turns out you can get them here too! Oh well. ;-) The little cake is the leftovers from the cake pops and was going to be iced to resemble a bird cage, but we ran out of time. ;-(
Happy Birthday, sweet Els! We hope you know how much you are loved!
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