{"id":2323,"date":"2011-12-21T08:36:52","date_gmt":"2011-12-21T13:36:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/simplelife\/?p=2323"},"modified":"2011-12-21T08:46:08","modified_gmt":"2011-12-21T13:46:08","slug":"happy-birthday-to-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2011\/12\/happy-birthday-to-me.html","title":{"rendered":"Happy Birthday to me"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I woke up at 6AM with the familiar beep-dong of my iPhone that tells me that I have a message on Facebook. \u00a0I was a bit startled because I don’t EVER get messages that early. \u00a0Then I remembered it was my birthday. \u00a0I repositioned myself under the warm quilt and went back to sleep. \u00a0By the 13th beep-dong in about 15 minutes, I turned down the ringer because I planned to finish my birthday “sleep in.”<\/p>\n

When I slowly emerged from the blankets, the messages were a wonderful beginning of my day.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>I’ve always loved that my birthday was four days before Christmas. \u00a0In my family growing up, all gifts and attention centered around Christmas. \u00a0We got one gift for our birthday but more gifts than we could count for Christmas. \u00a0Therefore, birthdays were barely recognized. \u00a0However, mine was special because I could get condolences all year round because–sadly–I was a “Christmas baby.”<\/p>\n

As the years have passed too swiftly, I’m still happy to have my birthday four days before Christmas. \u00a0I have a cake being cooked by my daughter, a day planned with my granddaughter, a “Happy Birthday, Grandma,” from my grandson. \u00a0My Facebook beep-bong keeps singing.<\/p>\n

I am blessed and happy that I’m having another birthday. \u00a0In fact, my heart is singing, “Happy birthday, to me…”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I woke up at 6AM with the familiar beep-dong of my iPhone that tells me that I have a message on Facebook. \u00a0I was a bit startled because I don’t EVER get messages that early. \u00a0Then I remembered it was my birthday. \u00a0I repositioned myself under the warm quilt and went back to sleep. \u00a0By…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":387,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[334,40,186,49,215,4,41],"tags":[21,688,739,696,699,715,701],"class_list":["post-2323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christmas","category-faith","category-hope","category-inspiration","category-love","category-simple-truths","category-spirituality","tag-christian","tag-christianity","tag-christmas","tag-church","tag-faith","tag-hope","tag-inspiration"],"yoast_head":"\nHappy Birthday to me - A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2011\/12\/happy-birthday-to-me.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Happy Birthday to me - A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I woke up at 6AM with the familiar beep-dong of my iPhone that tells me that I have a message on Facebook. \u00a0I was a bit startled because I don’t EVER get messages that early. \u00a0Then I remembered it was my birthday. \u00a0I repositioned myself under the warm quilt and went back to sleep. \u00a0By…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2011\/12\/happy-birthday-to-me.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-12-21T13:36:52+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2011-12-21T13:46:08+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/simplelife\/files\/2011\/12\/iphone-on-table-150x150.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Linda G. Howard\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Happy Birthday to me - A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2011\/12\/happy-birthday-to-me.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Happy Birthday to me - A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith","og_description":"I woke up at 6AM with the familiar beep-dong of my iPhone that tells me that I have a message on Facebook. \u00a0I was a bit startled because I don’t EVER get messages that early. \u00a0Then I remembered it was my birthday. \u00a0I repositioned myself under the warm quilt and went back to sleep. \u00a0By…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2011\/12\/happy-birthday-to-me.html","og_site_name":"A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith","article_published_time":"2011-12-21T13:36:52+00:00","article_modified_time":"2011-12-21T13:46:08+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/simplelife\/files\/2011\/12\/iphone-on-table-150x150.jpg"}],"author":"Linda G. 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