Birthday boy!

What an absolutely fantastic, ,magical, memorable 2nd Birthday Deqlan had - it was wonderful and we think he had a great day celebrating!

Firstly thank you so so so much to you all for your stunning messages on the blog, phone calls, text messages, emails and more - we are so touched at how many love and pray for our gorgeous Deqlan - thank you so much, we are Blessed to have you as family and friends!

I woke up a little earlier then our monkey to get his cake and balloons ready before he woke up. Dada and Deqlan came wondering into the lounge and Deqlan was delighted to see two burning candles and his Mickey Mouse cake and immediately ran to inspect them. Deqlan enjoyed Dad and Mama singing happy birthday and took great pleasure in sinking his hands and feet into Mickey Mouse - he enjoyed licking the icing of his toes even more!

After opening some gifts and enjoying the smiley faces and cars on his birthday cards, we went off to Grandpa and Nanna where the celebrations continued! Nanna outdid herself and created the most enchanting birthday table with streamers and balloons and banners-was stunning Mom, thank you for the amazing amount of effort you went to! Deqlans favorite part of the morning was definitely the balloons! Nanna made the most beautiful bouquet of balloons which Deqlan ran around with for at least half and hour! Then Meggie and Keaton arrived with a Mickey Mouse balloon and you can imagine what joy that brought to our soldier . Great Grandpa also arrived and Grandpa felt ok enough to come and sing Happy Birthday to our soldier and we all enjoyed eating what was left of the Mickey cake!

Great excitment continued as Deqlan enjoyed opening his presentsthat and reading the most exquisite cards , thank you Darling Grandpa and Nanna, Great Grandpa and Nanna, Meggie Con and Keaton for my stunning presies and the most phenomenal cards that you put so much love and effort into, i love you so very very much!

After a while, Deqlan started getting a little tired and was happy to have a little nap! When he woke up he was delighted to see that Dada had returned home from work early to take us to the zoo! So off Nanna, Dada, Mama and Deqlan went to the zoo ! It was fantastic! We hired a golf cart to ride around as the zoo is a huge area to walk . This was definitely the highlight - Deqlan LOVED being the golf cart and grabbed every oppurtunity to hop off and run and even had a go at trying to steer the cart! We saw beautiful penguins, alligators being fed ( that was not good for me to watch) , the most beautiful birds including flamingoes and eagles, tons of different types of buck and deer, beautiful elephants, giraffes, hippos - we saw them for the first time out of water and they are ENORMOUS! Deqlan enjoyed a little of the elies and a little of the seals, but otherwise, it was all about the golf cart, we didnt mind it was his day after all and we all enjoyed the fresh air and outing ! We loved the tigers ,lions and bears , but were so disapointed that the gorillas and koala were all closed up and asleep by the time we got to them- i was so disapointed, but that just means we will have to go back soon to see them!

We then came home and watched our soldier enjoying all his new toys , but the highlight was definitely watching his Mickey Mouse Clubhouse dvds he got from Nanna and Meggie - at the end of each episode ( as Nanna has already explained in her comment to us yesterday) The hot dog song plays - well, this is the best thing since cars to Deqlan and he screams with laughter, runs around and around laughing and giggling, he adores this , and we adore watching him - i promise to try and figure out how to get it off my camera and onto the blog!

Tommorow, celebrations continue as we are having a little party for Deqlan and some friends - a Cars theme party ! Cant wait to tell you all about it on Monday !

Tomorow is National Childhood Cancer day and to mark it, after the party tommorow, we are going to a CHOC function where we will build a bear! We plan to call him N.E.D!

From Arden's Mom - a GREAT idea to mark tomorow 13 Sep National Childhood Cancer awareness day

My mom had a great idea, and I thought of a way wecan all participate on Saturday. Each family can geta balloon (or two, or five), preferably gold (whichis the color for pediatric Cancer awareness), andadorn it with the names of those children they knowwho have battled or are battling childhood cancer.We can decorate our mailboxes, porches, or houseswith these balloons for the day, and in the evening(at sunset,) which is about 7:00 pm EST, we canrelease them together. This will be an easy way forus to mark the day, raise awareness, and honor our warriors and angels.So. there's another positive, active thing we cando.

Have a wonderful weekend, God Bless, lots of love

Mark, Samm and our 2 Year old Deqlan

REJOICE IN THE LORD , ALWAYS AND AGAIN I SAY REJOICE