A Sweet Retreat Story

I attended my favorite writers' retreat last weekend. It was wonderful in so many ways, but I would like to share one sweet story with you in particular.

Friday was our founder's birthday. Her brother surprised her with a birthday cake and candles after dinner Friday evening. We all sang to her and gave her a homemade envelope covered in beautiful illustrations, which one our authors made with supplies she'd brought with her. We each put a few dollars in the envelope, so she had a little gift from all of us.

Saturday is when the real fun happened. Our founder's brother is our cook, and he had been working on a huge surprise with our founder's sons. One of her sons lives in St. Louis, and the other lives in Iowa somewhere. She was a little sad that she wasn't going to get to see them this weekend, but she wasn't sad for long.

Her brother shared the plan with a few of us, so we watched out the window until we saw the car arrive. Our founder's sons, grandchildren, and her younger's son's fiancé arrived bearing flowers and a birthday cake. They snuck into the kitchen where she was doing meal prep. Her grandson stood beside her, looking up at her.

He stood there for a few heartbeats before she glanced over and saw him. She squealed in delight. Seeing her family there to celebrate her birthday absolutely thrilled our friend. She took them to her house after dinner and celebrated her birthday surround by her loving family.

We missed her for the rest of the retreat, but all of us were thrilled for her. Our founder had a great birthday, and her happiness rippled through our little group. Her happiness became ours.

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