He's Home
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Heavenly Birthday Celebration
/We had Sarah Annie's birthday party on All Saints' Day (after celebrating pretty much all week). It makes perfect sense to me to celebrate on this day. To me, she's definitely an All Saints' Day baby. And for the record, she was born on the vigil. I freely admit this party was all about me. First of all, it was small. Well, actually, not that small, because just immediate family is a good sized party by most standards and then we kept adding people, as is our style. But it started out as just a little gathering to eat beef stew (Sarah's only favorite meal), watch football, sing "Happy Birthday" and have cake. Along the way, it morphed into about twenty people or so. Oh, and a puppy. My dad brought his puppy. Puppies and birthdays go together somehow, don't they?
But back to my Sarah Annie's birthday party. For nine kids and 21 years, I've always wanted a birthday ring. Isn't it darling?(Sorry for the blurry pictures. Apparently, my camera jumped off the playhouse the other day. But nothing bad happened to it, Mom. I promise! Yeah, right, nothing. Except that it doesn't work the way it used to work.)
And then, this is the cake I thought about during delivery (no, kidding--as soon as I was sure I wasn't going to die, I started planning a party:-). It's a hazelnut cake with chocolate ganache filling and French buttercream frosting. Doesn't everyone have a nut and chocolate cake for a first birthday?
We were surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses last year during a tricky pregnancy and delivery. Some special ones are represented here. These are all the saints who kept me company, all the ones whose prayers were inside that pretty pink binder I kept with me at all times.
(Bl. John Paul the Great, St. Gianna Molla, St. Anne)
(Our Lady of Guadalupe (in the blue green), St. Joseph, St. Therese, St. Gerard)
(St. Gerard, St. Padre Pio, St. Sarah)
Sarah Annie had a wonderful time at her party. She seemed to love being the center of attention and she especially enjoyed the singing of "Happy Birthday," which is a great thing because Karoline is still singing it today:-).
Many, many thanks to Tammy at Catholic Folk Toys for creating such beautiful dolls. I contacted her during the summer and she was lovely and gracious and very willing to fill special orders so that Sarah Annie now has a basket full of replicas of very dear and holy friends.
Blessed Birthday, Sarah Anne!
/It's shortly after midnight on October 31st. And I'm awake. I've promised that I won't spend this day reliving the fear of the same day last year. And I won't spend it reliving the pain. Instead, I will spend it celebrating the joy of my little girl and the great gift of grace. And so I will ramble along a bit with you as I greet this day.
We call her Sarah Annie. It was Karoline who first giggled the name and no one says it quite so adorably as she does. But we all say it. If not the whole thing, more often than not she is called "Annie." It just suits her.
I remember when I first saw her without the tubes and wires. She was all dressed in tiny preemie clothes in the NICU and she looked to me to be even more vulnerable than she did when every breath was measured. Sweet, tiny baby, she was all mine to hold and before long, to take home. Her homecoming was a surprise. Mary Beth and I carried her ever so gently to the car and I think we both held our breath, all the way home, while counting every single breath Sarah Annie took.
She was so little she fit neatly into a doll basket. The doll looked big beside her.
Not any more.
I know she's likely my last baby and yet, I don't for a moment want to stop time with her. Let's be very clear: I'm sad to think that there will be no babies in this house, but those are thoughts for another day. I'm not sad at all that Sarah Annie is growing and changing. I've delighted in every new gurgle and coo, every single milestone. She's darling and with every day, she becomes even more dear. Babies grow and change so much the first year; it's a privilege and a blessing to begin to get a glimpse of the person they are. I'm happy to be looking forward to getting to know my Sarah Annie even better in the coming year.
My favorite milestone (so far) was the day she really, really smiled. She took her time figuring out the whole smile thing (kind of like the eating thing, and the breathing thing, and the keeping oneself warm thing), and there were concerns that she wasn't really seeing us or that she couldn't respond. Every day, a dozen times a day or more, I'd pray that she would smile. Just let me know she's there and she's happy. Please reassure me that all is well. And then one day, that happy grin bubbled up from her sweet heart and she blessed us immensely with her smile. There were dimples! Oh those dimples! For a moment, I thought of the little bandaids that held the tubes across her cheeks in the NICU. Did dimples magically grow beneath them? Probably not, but we never discount the possibility of fairy dust around here and those dimples are the stuff of fairy tales.
A graduate of Kangaroo Care, Sarah Annie loves to snuggle. She tucks her head under my chin and melts in my heart. She likes to sleep that way. Actually, that's pretty much the only way she likes to sleep. Someday, I'm going to miss that. Right now, I'm just plain happy to have her there, even if I am perpetually tired. It's nice to easily make the world peaceful for our little love.
She doesn't crawl yet, though she does scoot a bit ever so slowly on her bottom. If we put her down and wait for her to crawl, she protests. Loudly and with authority. No one here can stand to hear her fuss. And so, she gets scooped up and entertained and spoiled just a little. She likes to pull herself to standing and I know it won't be long before she lets go and then propels herself into the great big world. Sarah Annie will smile at the world. I know she will. All those smile prayers are still answered every day. Smile, Sarah Annie. The whole world smiles with you.
Happy, happy birthday, baby mine.
Celebrating Sarah Anne
/Sarah Annie has a birthday this week. We are so not going to confine the celebration to a single day:-)
