My husband,  as I have mentioned, is a brave and wonderful ,did I say handsome, firefighter/paramedic in Los Angeles. He works 24 hour shifts and sometimes many in a row. He, and his colleagues are subject to overtime at any given moment.  This wreaks havoc with just about every part of our home life.

All of the major holidays can be disrupted, missed, spent at the fire station or postponed.

Birthdays are no exception. We choose to celebrate as a family on whichever day falls closest to that date of not working.

Today is our son’s seventh birthday and daddy had to work.  That’s no biggie in our life , we will just celebrate tomorrow.  However, it does confuse the children.  Cries of “where are my presents, where are the cake and balloons ?” can be heard over the day. He knows it’s his birthday but it’s hard when you are counting down the days and someone moves the finish line.

Reassurances are given and claims of having two birthdays  and being super special seem to be doing the trick !

Christmas is the hardest one. Going to the fire station is a two hour drive one way and quite often we are left sitting whilst the men run their calls  and their turkey  dinner gets cold.  The kids don’t get to open their presents until Boxing Day and Daddy sometimes doesn’t get home until 10 AM. That’s torture for small children !!

New Year’s Eve’s have been lonely  and we have spent many Easter egg hunts without Daddy pointing out the one up the tree.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not all doom and gloom for a firefighter wife. We get to have our husband home for days at a time and taking a month off for a summer vacation is not out of the question .  It’s just a matter of making things work  and changing things around.

We are making our own rules.

Happy birthday little fella.The cake will be here tomorrow and so will Daddy ❤️