Happy Birthday to Graysen

This picture that Emily sent yesterday is so perfect and so perfectly depicts this big 6-year-old.  She never walks when she can run, and she is full of life and fun and curiosity.

I met her when she was 1-day-old and fell completely in love with her.  I actually fell in love with her when I first heard she was going to be born, even before I knew whether she was a boy or girl or what her personality was going to be or anything about her.

I've saved so many of the texts between Emily and me those months before she was born, just imaging her and planning for her and not knowing what to expect.

This is what I wrote after we got to Washington and met her.


I have this memory that makes me teary this morning thinking about it.  On the way to the airport, I was busy texting and talking to people and being so excited and reading things to Mike as he drove.  We stopped in a little town on the way to the airport to eat something, and it is etched in my memory how I felt at that moment.  I don't remember the name of the restaurant or what we ate, but I do remember that feeling of euphoria.  Mike felt it too, and we would talk, but we couldn't stop grinning at each other across the table.  We were entering into a new phase of our lives and welcomed every second of anticipation.

So from that first day, we just adored this little girl, and everything she did was just amazing and wonderful.  We had to leave her and go back home, but we pounced on every picture and text until we could see her again.

Many things have changed in those years.  My life has been turned upside down and then settled into a new one, and the one constant in all this has been Graysen and then Katherine and the love I have for them - and so much that they give back to me.  I know there will be a time when she grows up and not so close to me, but so far her face lights up when she sees me every day, and she still sits in my lap and pats my face, and I'm going to enjoy every minute.  She remembers PopPop, or says she does, and is unfailingly certain that she will see him again and listen to his stories and eat chocolate raisins together.

Unfortunately, I don't have all day to go about this special girl who has to miss her school birthday celebration today because of a snow day.  I know she will get to wear her special birthday crown tomorrow - on Valentine's Day or the next day, but she will be so excited.

Saturday is the big birthday party at the YMCA.  It's a bouncy house party with lots of unicorns and pink things and a special cake and so many friends.  We're praying for good weather by then so people can get there easily, even though snow and rain are predicted.

I'll come back and find some of her other birthday pictures as I have time today.  I'm hoping someone will brave the snow and ice and bring her to me!