Surprise!

A couple of weeks ago John and I were invited to a dessert party taking place on the 13th at a friends house. We didn't have any plans and I thought that sounded pretty fun (and delicious). We planned on it and when our friend Sam was taking care of Malachi during the anniversary celebration she put it on the calendar for us to make sure we didn't forget. Friday night John and Malachi made a delicious dump cake and we made our way over to Lynn's place. When we walked in the door everyone was looking at us and they yelled "SURPRISE!!!" My initial reaction was that of confusion and when I saw the pile of presents in the middle of the room I knew it was a surprise baby shower for John and I. It was so sweet!!

Unfortunately I didn't have a camera with me so I have no pictures, but a friend did and when I get a hold of them I'll have to share. There were desserts as promised as well as a wonderful pomegranate cheese with crackers and a fruit platter that Malachi went straight for. John and Malachi's dump cake was a huge hit and many people asked for the recipe.

The hostess put together three shower games that were Foreign Service Baby Shower games. In each of them Secretary Clinton gave us an assignment, one assignment was to name the baby using places she's been and people she's met. The night's favorite was Pakistanly ConGen Roy. The second game was to plan out our next seven posts to make sure that the Roy Boys got a lot of Global Exposure and good education through their lives. John didn't take part in that one, but was surprised by all the employment advancements that he made and on my plan he even got Ambassador!

After the second game, they encouraged us to open presents and who can say no to that! All of the presents were from all of our friends who were present and they told me I had to open the small boxes first. So I did and we got the little robe and booties set that I registered for as well as some matching wash cloths. Then I grabbed what I thought was going to be a bath tub and instead opened the body of the stroller that we registered for!! I was so excited! All the other presents (three more) were parts of the stroller (wheels in one bag, front wheel portion with the basket that goes under the stroller in another bag, and in the big box was the tray for the baby, the toy for the tray, and the hub caps for the rear tires). Yay Stroller!!! I'm so excited for that! John put it loosely together before we left so everyone could see it together and we let Malachi ride home in it. It's a big stroller! Malachi fit in it just fine. but what I like about it is that the back reclines so that we can put an infant in it that's not sitting.

While John was putting the stroller together they played the last game. The assignment from Secretary Clinton was to suggest words to us that we could repeat to the baby to make them the first words instead of simple words like mama and dada. We had some great suggestions in Chinese, Spanish, Malay, Korean, Arabic, and Hindi. Ahh the Foreign Service!

Both John and I were sincerely and very surprised, they did a great job of keeping it a secret. We're so happy and so blessed to have the friends here that we do. It makes being away from friends and family that much easier.