16th Birthday Dinner for Miss C

Nearly 11:30 p.m. as I type.... we just got back from a birthday dinner celebration for our Young Miss C, who will be Sweet Sixteen this coming week. We told C that she could invite one of her friends to have dinner with us, and she picked her best friend L. Those two girls do most everything together, and it's fun just to listen to them giggle over the usual teen-aged girl stuff.

Off to Babbo Bruno's we went for dinner, C's favorite place. We've taken her there for her 13th, 14th, and 15th birthday dinner also. Come to think of it, the first time we took her there was for her 13th birthday, and it's been her favorite place ever since. C is so attuned to that restaurant that she can tell whether her meal has been prepared by Stefano or by one of his assistants. She ordered spinach-stuffed ravioli tonight, and as soon as we saw the plate, we knew Stefano had fixed it for her. Not so with the mussels in pesto that we all shared as an appetizer.... as soon as we tasted the sauce, we knew that someone else had taken care of that order, so we asked K to bring it back to the kitchen for Stefano's special touch.

We all enjoyed every minute of the dinner tonight... we were there for over three hours, having "birthday moments" (opening presents) between the courses. As always, C was thrilled with the gifts we gave her. She took all the ribbons and tied them into her hair as she opened each package, and even made an impromptu hat out of pink and leopard-print tissue paper. Her joy is pure and simple, and everyone in our corner of the restaurant was sharing in her birthday.

Her gifts.... I bought her a Houston Astros charm bracelet (Danbury Mint issue) that she squealed over, and my husband used his photo-shop magic to print out a glossy picture of Craig Biggio (her precious favorite)--- Craig was holding a pink banner-sized Sweet Sixteen birthday card for her in the picture... that was the hit of the night for C, I'm sure. I also found a book in the Young Adult section of the bookstore at the library with C's name in the title, which she just loved, plus a book on getting ready for the Junior and Senior Proms, and also one of the "Sweet Valley High" teen books. Then there's the sign for her room that I had found in one of the shops in League City--- it's made of painted metal (pink, green and yellow) and it spells out C's favorite phrase: "Whatever!" -- She just loved that and I'm sure she'll be asking her dad to hang that up in her room right away. I also gave C something from my jewelry box... a gold ring with little emeralds in it. She had seen that last year and tried it on and loved the green color, so I took it out of my jewelry box the next day and brought it to the jeweler to be polished up and put into a fancy new ring box. It had been sitting in C's birthday gift bag ever since, waiting for tonight. She just loved it when she opened it tonight, as I knew she would.

I also had a party favor-bag for L, filled with chocolates, cookies, a "Sweet Valley High" book, a purse-shaped notepad and pretty pink-rhinestone pen, and a black-cat pin studded with tiny rhinestones. L's birthday is in April-- her 16th as well. The girls were talking about jewelry and jewelry boxes at dinner tonight, and L said that she didn't have her own jewelry box. So that's what I will buy for L for her Sweet Sixteenth gift.

Nice night... delicious dinner.... and having K working at the restaurant tonight was the perfect touch. C loves K, and asked us right away if she could be our waitress tonight, which is what we had arranged when we made the reservations. The look on K's face was priceless tonight as she watched C decorating her hair with the ribbons, and making that little hat out of the tissue paper. I don't think that K had an easy childhood, as C has had, but that hasn't stopped K from enjoying C's enthusiasm, both at the restaurant for dinners and here at our home for parties.

Sweet Sixteen. This child has been in our lives since she was in the second grade. Her joy is endless and spontaneous, her kindness is genuine. And over the years, she has given us far more than we could ever give her in return.