#babyharveyjames

that's the hashtag we trended on harvey's birthday.)

i had gotten a groupon deal for lanterns and invited several families, and our whole neighborhood actually, (since i wanted to give everyone a heads up about fire floating through the air, i figured, why not?) to celebrate our special boy with us. we planned a hot chocolate bar for after the lanterns. addie enjoyed helping get everything ready.

it was such a nice night, really just about perfect.

it had been drizzly all day, and even just a few minutes before we went to light them, but thankfully the rain held off and we were able to send them up.

we met up at the green for the send off. one of our neighbors met us there too. i know her from girl scouts, but was still kinda surprised she came. after we sent the first few lanterns up i was able to talk to her and thank her for coming to celebrate our baby. she said she was also celebrating her baby too. we hugged and cried and it was really special. ooooh missing babies is so painful. never goes away.

we played "clouds" by zach sobiech, just like we did for the original lantern lighting. it was perfect.

i love the idea of all our family, all over the country doing the same thing on the same day. harvey was celebrated in wa, ca, or, ut, nv, ny, mi, tx, id, and md. that's pretty incredible.

several neighbors posted about how much they enjoyed seeing the lanterns flying. the only damper on my night was finding out, after the party ended, that these are actually illegal in md. :/ our teenage neighbor kind of jokingly asked if they were legal when we sent up our trial lantern from our house. that thought had never even crossed my mind, and it bothered me all night. apparently people have been hurt by the fires not being fully extinguished by the time they landed. i would never want to put anyone in harms way, so we'll have to figure out something for next year.:(

 

i had send a pack to lex for her and her roomies to send off, but i bought them from a different manufacturer and they had some problems. let's just say the girls stayed busy putting out some small fires in idaho... not sure if it was user error, low quality lanterns, or what, but momma felt bad.

 

frankie and laney got cold and either stood there too cold to do anything, or hung out in the car. and christian and brenna took lots of pictures and helped with the music. and matt walked around lighting lanterns, managing girls, etc. we were all there, even if we weren't all pictured. :)

after, we all had a nice time visiting and warming up with hot cocoa.

it was a very touching tribute to our sweet baby boy. i am thankful to have this little angel in our family, and thankful for the lessons we've all taken away from this experience.