Birth of Baha'u'llah - how we celebrated

Today we, Baha’is around the world, celebrate the Birth of the Promised One, the Prince of Peace, the Glory of God – the Birth of Baha’u’llah.

On this special occasion last night we had a lovely family gathering with few friends and besides our older one there was one more girl of the same age. We started the celebration in the garden which our friends decorated with rose petals, 9 pointed start made out of yarn, more petals and candles:

We were greeted by children throwing rose petals at us and were lead to the sitting area through a small pathway:

Throwing petals apparently is fun, so the girls kept collecting and throwing petals over and over again!

We had some tasty masala chai made by our Indian friend with some samosas and little Chinese cakes. Unfortunately the weather decided to change for colder that evening, so we didn’t spend much time at the garden. We chanted a couple of prayers and moved into the house for more activities.

A mom of the other girl is also very crafty. She prepared a great activity based on the quote: “Joy gives us wings”. It is a paper butterfly with a heart in the middle. And here it is how to make it – apologies for blurry pictures!

You need any type of paper, colorful, tissue paper – whatever you like. It just should be easy to fold. We used a special paper from a Buddhist shop that is used for some ceremonies (it is soft and has silver or gold squares in the middle).

Scissors

Glue

1. Fold the paper into half by forming a triangle (you can cut the ages in different shapes)

2. Fold the paper into ruffles

3. Repeat with a second piece of paper

4. Now fold ruffled paper into half and tie both pieces with a pipe cleaner or a piece of yarn in the middle

5. Cut out a heart and glue it in the middle. Then you can put them around the house to remind you that when we are joyous it is as if we get a pair of wings!