Skip to main content

On Your Birthday...

 This day makes me so sappy--I am half weepy every year and half so happy and grateful.  But every year I cry for your birth mom.  This lady I do not know, but this lady that gave up so much and in turn, gave me so much.  I think of her as a brave woman.  She carried you to term.  She cared for you as best as she could for several weeks and then she bravely gave you up and placed you at the gate of the best orphanage in Kigali.  I think she's brave.  But I cry for her.  I cry for her because of what must have made her make the decision to give you up.  I cry for her because she doesn't have you any more.  I cannot fathom the hole you would leave in someone's heart forever.

There are so many things that I wish she knew about you.  I'm sure when we get to heaven and get to meet and I begin to tell her stories about her spunky daughter that she will nod her head knowingly because you are probably so much like her and like her mother.  There are so many things I cannot wait to tell her!!

I'd tell her how much better you have made my life--our lives.  You've made this family better in so many ways.  I cannot even imagine us without you--we would be so incomplete.  I'm so thankful for you, Gabby.  I'd tell her how sweet you are and how you have the amazing and unique ability to love people in the way that they need to be loved.  You have figured out how people receive love and you give it to them in that exact way.  For Andy it is through playfulness and banter, for me it is through snuggling.  You are sugar and spice.  I love thinking of you as fluffy overly sweet powderers sugar, but that story would be incomplete without knowing that you are spice--jalepano and cayenne pepper spicy!  You are so funny!  You crack us up all of the time!  You are caring and compassionate.  You are tenacious.  Oh my!  You never give up and you are not afraid to practice until you are perfect.  You are a perfectionist, you know that!  You love big and love well.  You are kind and sweet.  You are scared and timid sometimes and you are brave and bold others.  You're smart and intuitive.  I could go on and on with the amazing qualities you possess.  Your mother would be so proud of you.  I am so proud of you.

Gabby, I love you with all my heart.  I hope that somehow your birth mom knows that you are loved and adored.  I hope she knows somewhere in the depths of her soul that you have a family who would fight for you until the end.  I hope she knows somehow that we love you with a ferocity that would make her proud.

You're my baby girl and nothing in the world could tear you away from me.  I am thankful for you.  I am blessed by you.  You bring a joy and a fullness to my life that wouldn't be here without you.  You put a face and a feeling to being adopted by God as an equal heir.  I love you like you were my own flesh and blood and there is no difference in my eyes or in my heart.  You're mine and I would hold onto you forever if I could.  But I know that you are a butterfly and you'll fly off into the big world someday--that I know for a fact.  I'm thankful that that day is a decade away!

I love you, Goober.  You're make life better every single day!  Happy 8th Birthday!

Comments

Rammy Jones said…
This was my second time attending an event at this place, and was my first business event here (the other event was a charity show). Everything at event location rentals place was perfect, the drinks and food was amazing. Even the coffee was wonderful.
July 28, 2015 at 5:27 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Grief of a Stepmom

The grief of a stepmom.  This post has had so many titles:  The Invisible Grief of a Stepmom, The Silent Grief of a Stepmom, The Lonely Grief of a Stepmom. . . the grief of a stepmom is like no other grief because it feels so homeless. My stepson died a few weeks ago.   Marc and I have only been married eight months and Mackay, my stepson, lived in NYC and we rarely got to see him (he didn't get to come to the wedding or Cabo and didn't stay with us when he came to town), so I didn't have much of a relationship with him.  So there is a weird layer of loosing someone I hardly knew and I feel like that is the layer that makes the most sense to everyone.   While the family was mourning, I was the one organizing all of the meals coming in from our wonderful friends and neighbors, I was cleaning up one meal and setting up for the next.  I was keeping the house in order and making sure Marc was able to surround himself with the friends and family he needed to make it through the
8 comments
Read more

Should've Said No. . . ?

Andy proposed during a curtain call of Me and My Girl , a musical in which he played an old man who went most of his life without telling the woman he loved that he loved her... Twenty-three years ago today Andy asked me to marry him. . . .  he was my best friend and I thought he was the love of my life.  Should I have said no? I don't know how many times I have now been asked a version of that question in the past couple of years and I cannot count the number of times I have asked myself that question over the past decade, but it is a dumb question with no great answer. If I would have said no 23 years ago, I would have saved myself from so many tears and so much pain, but I would have missed so much laughter and so many exciting firsts and I would be such a different person. . . . Because of this day, 23 years ago, I am who I am and I have so much to be thankful for. Because of this day, 23 years ago, I have five of the best kids on the planet.  They are t
8 comments
Read more

Mother's Day Thoughts

I've been feeling so many Mother's Day feels this weekend.  For starters, my big kids came home to surprise me and that was the most wonderful thing!  I remember Mother's Day 2017 when I cried because Hays was a Senior in high school and heading to Texas A&M and I thought it would be my last Mother's Day with my five all together. . . . and yesterday proved those tears unnecessary!  And then, as if that wasn't more than I could ever wish for, Marc spoiled me like I have never been spoiled before.  I am consistently blown away and humbled by how much he appreciates me and shows me his appreciation with words, gifts, acts of service and more.  I am so grateful for this husband of mine and the way he loves me and shows our kids what selfless love is supposed to look like! But even before yesterday, I've been thinking a lot about all of the different dimensions of motherhood I now experience and it is shaping me into a new and stronger and more compassionate and
Post a Comment
Read more